


Goetia

by DoilySpider



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Demon Summoning, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, M/M, Slow recovery, Sort Of, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture, ritual abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-05-30 22:59:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 11
Words: 30,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19413184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoilySpider/pseuds/DoilySpider
Summary: Summoning was usually a mere matter of irritation and inconvenience for celestial beings, although rarely any real trouble.But this time, just this time, a ritual of dark intent will threaten to destroy the life Crowley has been struggling to build after being released from Hell's service. And, perhaps, destroy Crowley himself.After all, who should feel badly for what becomes of a demon?





	1. I: Charmed & Bewitched

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! This first chapter is light, but please do be mindful of the tags and content warnings that will kick in later. Take care of yourselves. Thank you.

There was a bustle outside of the Secondary School, parents congratulating their children on jobs well done (regardless of how well they had, in fact, been done). More distant relations were already departing, cars crawling out of the lot, wary of little ones. But one student in particular had quite the entourage waiting to congratulate him. There were his parents, of course, who were already fussing over him. But the family was quite grateful to the showing of family friends and neighbors who had arrived to wish him well. Family friends who included, not that the parents would know, a witch, a witchfinder, an angel, and a demon.

The demon in question was, at the moment, giving the angel a bit of a lecture. “Oh, stop sulking!” Crowley hissed through his teeth, glancing to make sure they were out of Adam’s earshot. “This was your idea.”

Fortunately, Adam was at the moment quite preoccupied with his mother adjusting the carnation on his lapel and the skew of his top hat.

Aziraphale, for his part, was cross-armed and pouting at the ground. “He was… fine. Just fine.”

“He was better than you,” Crowley said, leaning in. “That’s what you mean to say, right? You give the boy _one_ stage magic lesson, and now he’s better than you.”

“He is not better than me!” Aziraphale snapped. He glanced, desperately, at Anathema and Newt. “Right?”

Their human companions politely avoided eye contact.

A wry smile crossed Crowley’s lips. He supposed traits like this in Aziraphale might infuriate some people. The pettiness, the jealousy. But he loved it. It always reminded him that for all his goodness, Aziraphale wasn’t some divine object, he was a person through and through, and Crowley adored him for it. “You should be proud,” he said. “You’ve created a monster.”

“Well don’t put it like that,” Aziraphale said, shoulders slacking.

Brightly, and clearly trying to lighten a mood that Crowley thought didn’t really need any lightening, Anathema perked up and asked. “Aziraphale, when did you get into performance magic?”

“Oh, here we go,” Crowley said, leaning up against a nearby lamppost. 

“I’m so glad you asked!” Aziraphale said, clapping his hands together and turning to her. “I’ve always been a patron of the performing arts, you see. And over the millennia, I’ve tried to keep up with its different forms. I believe it was in… the late 19th century… yes, somewhere around the 1870s, and there were a pair of gentlemen I chanced to meet at Piccadilly who…”

Crowley zoned out completely as Aziraphale went through a speech Crowley already knew top to bottom. He didn’t care about the magic, could not possibly care less in fact. But he cared that Aziraphale cared. Oh, he might protest and sneer. But deep down he was weak to anything that made Aziraphale smile, that made him excited, that got him animated and lively. Passion made him beautiful. Well, even more beautiful than usual.

“But what of you?” Aziraphale said to Anathema, capping off his ramble. “How did you get involved with your magics?”

Anathema smiled and shrugged. “Oh, I was raised in it,” she said. “Family tradition. It started with folk herbalism, and we picked up the occult later to help us with a fuller understanding of Agnes’ prophecies.” She glanced between Crowley and Aziraphale. “I’m sure what I do seems like child’s play to you, with all you can do.”

“Oh no,” Crowley said. “I’ve seen humans work powerful magic indeed. Just look at the car.”

Newt’s head tipped like a curious dog. “Cars are technology, not magic.”

“Matter of opinion,” Crowley said. His attention shot back to Anathema. Something had been itching at his curiosity about the witch. “You ever summon anything?”

Anathema frowned intently. “No. Never. I thought it was too dangerous, and also very unfair. Besides, now if I want a favor from an angel or demon, I just have to pick up my phone.”

“Thanks for helping me move my things into the cottage, by the by,” Newt said with a sunny smile.

“Oh!” Aziraphale said, a hand to his heart. “It was our sincere pleasure.”

Crowley shifted his weight a bit and shoved his hands in his pockets. “Well, I wasn’t doing anything.”

Adam came running up to them, finally free of his mother’s excited cooing and photos with the family. “Everyone! Thanks for coming! What did you think? Did you like it?”

“Fantastic,” Crowley said, sincerely. “Truly outstanding.” And he really, truly had liked it. Something about it seemed less embarrassing when Adam did it, even though sometimes it seemed like perhaps Adam had retained some trace of his own powers. Maybe because he was a young teen. Or maybe because he didn’t lay it on as thick as Aziraphale did. In fact, Crowley turned to mouth a ‘be nice’ at Aziraphale. 

But the angel was genuinely beaming, and he said, “I am so proud of you” with all the twinkle-eyed earnesty in his little heart. And Crowley was proud of him. He truly was.

Later, in the car, after they’d said their goodbyes and taken their leave, Crowley drove, stealing glances at Aziraphale which made him nearly miss stop signs more than once. “You’re cute when you’re frustrated, did you know that?”

“I am not!” Aziraphale huffed.

“There, you see? Like that.”

Aziraphale put on a big show of indignation for a moment longer before relaxing and adding, “Well… you’re rather cute when you’re being supportive.”

“Oh, shut up,” Crowley said, swinging down a narrow country lane.

Aziraphale tensed briefly and gripped at the car door handle, but soon relaxed, having grown far too accustomed to this. “You are. It meant a lot to Adam to see you tonight. And it meant a lot to me too.”

“Now you’re being all sincere,” Crowley said, pressing back into his seat. “Makes me wish I didn’t lead with a dig.”

Aziraphale was watching the world go by outside, and the moonlight gave him this lovely soft glow. “Well, you can’t fool me, you old serpent,” he said. “You can tease me all you like, but I know you care for me.” Something melted in Crowley’s heart then, hearing him, seeing him so assured in their relationship. The fear of what once had been forbidden and frightful between them was gone. Aziraphale was comfortable with him. Truly comfortable. He’d been excited and joyful and giddy at first and that all had been lovely. But comfortable was the best look on him and Crowley delighted in it.

It made Crowley wonder if it was time. He always liked to let Aziraphale set the pace. He had so many more anxieties and reservations going in. So their first date had been Aziraphale’s choice, having sex for the first time had been Aziraphale’s choice, moving in together had been Aziraphale’s choice. It was better that way, it let Crowley be sure things were right for him. Because if it were all up to Crowley, it would have all happened at once, he wouldn’t have been able to contain himself if he were calling the shots. He’d waited for Aziraphale for so long. But it made him happy just to know Aziraphale was happy and safe. And he was comfortable with him now. How beautiful that was. Which made Crowley finally feel safe enough to be the first one to broach something.

“Have you ever thought about getting married?” Crowley tensed a little after giving voice to it, eyes fixed intensely on the road.

He heard Aziraphale shift suddenly in his seat beside him. “What?”

“I think I might want to get married,” said Crowley, watching the trees flicker past in the glow of his headlights. “No pressure. Only if you feel like it. Just… thought it might be nice to make it all official-like.” He drummed his fingers on the wheel. “I’d like to be able to call you my husband. To call myself yours. I like how that feels.”

Aziraphale audibly swallowed. His breath was shivering. “I…”

Damn, he’d gone and made him nervous, hadn’t he? “Again, no pressure,” he stressed. “Just putting it out there. Testing the waters.”

“I think I would like that very much,” Aziraphale whispered.

The radio cut in with Freddie Mercury belting, “ _We are the champions, my friends--_ ”

And Crowley couldn’t even find it in him to be exasperated with his car. Because Aziraphale wanted it too. He reached out without even looking and when Aziraphale gave him his hand, he brought it to his mouth to kiss it. “Alright. Alright. I’ll do a proper proposal then. Get you a ring. Private? Public?”

“I don’t care,” Aziraphale blurted out.

“We could do it at St. James,” said Crowley, nuzzling against his hand, kissing it again. “Let everyone in the world know I am yours.”

“Crowley, dear, watch the road.”

Crowley sighed and swerved back into the correct lane, reluctantly letting go of Aziraphale’s hand. “The road can wait, I’m busy.” 

Sniffing, Aziraphale said. “I never thought… I never let myself think I could have something like this. Something like what we have.”

“Angel, are you crying?” Crowley turned to fondly caress Aziraphale’s face, to wipe a tear away from his cheek.

“ _The road_ , Crowley.”

“Fine, fine.” Crowley forced himself to put both hands back on the wheel and his attention on the road, which he’d started to drift slightly off of. But there was this excited flutter in his chest. How could he help but be distracted? His angel wanted to marry him. That, now, that was the real magic. “You can have this,” he promised. “You can have me. For as long as you want me, and as long as time and space exists, you can have me.”


	2. II: The Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, buckle up because the content warnings kick in now.

They stayed up all night together, watching wretched old scary movies on the television. Crowley pointed out the ridiculous line reads and technical failings while Aziraphale cowered against him. But every time Crowley asked if it was too much and if they should turn it off, Aziraphale refused and pressed harder into his side. So of course Crowley knew he just liked the excuse to cuddle. As if he needed one. They were going to get married.

They’d settled into a light doze by morning. Not that they needed the sleep, they were both just so comfortable. Finally, when the sun was at just the right angle to start becoming a bother, Aziraphale stirred. He reached up, gently brushed a few strands of Crowley’s auburn hair back into place. “I think I might well go open the bookshop,” he said.

“How charitable of you,” Crowley muttered, rubbing some sleep out of his eyes.

Aziraphale chuckled. “What will you do with your day?”

Crowley roused himself. “Ah, thought I’d take a drive,” he said. “Might swing by Mayfair, got a bit of shopping to do.” He adjusted Aziraphale’s bowtie and straightened out his collar for him.

With a little quirk of the eyebrow, Aziraphale said, “Anything in particular?”

“You’ll see,” Crowley said. “In fact, are you free for a bit of a walk after work?”

“I believe I can fit that into my schedule,” said Aziraphale. He pushed himself up from the sofa and went to fetch his coat from the wall. Everything of his seemed so bright against the dim backdrop of Crowley’s--no, their--flat that he seemed to be illuminated. Or maybe that was just him. 

Crowley sighed, watching him tease his fair curls back into place. “Might fit in a couple quick temptations while I’m at it.”

Aziraphale smirked at him a bit. “Well, don’t you cause too much trouble.”

They both knew, of course, that over the last couple years ‘temptations’ had come to mean something completely different for Crowley. He’d never been interested in having anything like a career like Aziraphale had. And, of course, when he’d been on assignment for Hell, they breathed down his neck a bit too closely to allow him to really explore his options. Temptations felt like such a comfortable, familiar way to fill his time. But now that Hell was choosing to pointedly ignore his very existence, he didn’t have to do it in a way that came with the baggage of the possible damnation of the human beings he loved so much. No, now when Crowley skulked about London and elsewhere to do temptations, he was the little voice hissing in people’s ears to go for the things they’d been denying themselves. Yes, buy the dress, you’ll be stunning. Yes, speak your mind, your parents need to hear the truth. Yes, ask him out, it’s worth the risk. It was familiar work but this time it was his, in his way and for his reasons and for the sake of his side. The side of the Earthlings, which included Aziraphale and himself. 

It was a sort of mischief, but it didn’t make him feel sick and knotted up inside, and Aziraphale found it darling, so it was an all-around positive.

“No promises,” Crowley said.

“Well, don’t be out too late?” Aziraphale said, coming back to the couch to lean over him.

“Not on my life,” said Crowley.

Aziraphale nodded once, then bent down to press a kiss into Crowley’s lips, which he gladly accepted, lingering a moment before sinking away from it. “I love you,” Aziraphale said.

“Love you,” said Crowley. “Think about selling a book, won’t you?”

With a small sigh, Aziraphale ran a thumb down Crowley’s cheek and finally forced himself to leave.

The ring, after an agonizing two hours at Aspreys and a small miracle which revealed that yes, actually, they  _ did _ have it in this size and this metal tone, was now safely and securely in Crowley’s possession. He sat back in the Bentley now, scrutinizing it, because he still wasn’t sure. It rather felt like nothing in the world was good enough for his angel. But the ring was simple, understated so as not to clash with the rest of Aziraphale’s more elaborate jewelry. It was white gold, with a diamond that held a pale blue hue that Crowley thought would bring out his eyes. It reminded him of him. But he couldn’t stop second-guessing himself. Should he have gotten something more elaborate? Or should he leaned more toward something that would remind Aziraphale of him instead, maybe with onyx or rubies or beryl. “Bless it,” he growled, and snapped the box shut. Oh, Aziraphale would coo uncontrollably and mist up at anything he gave him, he was sure. But would it be perfect? It had been over 6000 damn years, Crowley needed it to be perfect. That was too much build-up for a lackluster follow-through. He cracked open the box again and now he wasn’t even sure it was the right shade of blue.

He was so busy staring at the ring he didn’t even notice the way the outline of his body seemed to blur. He didn’t pay much mind to the buzzing sensation in all of his muscles. He thought maybe he was going through a bit of stress-induced lightheadedness. 

Summoning was usually a mere matter of irritation and inconvenience for celestial beings, although rarely any real trouble. Crowley had always been glad he’d never had to deal with it. For one, most books on the subject were rife with fanciful information. They called for ornate rituals, and described areas of expertise too excruciatingly specific to be practical. Some sources, for example, cite the demon Valac as knowing the true locations of hidden treasures, when the fact of the matter is that no power in Hell would trust him with the location of a paperclip. Several names listed in the most popular grimoires corresponded to no demon Crowley had ever heard of. In fact, he was fairly sure this supposed “Stolas” was just an owl who had startled a 17th century theologian.

When most people think of summonings, they probably think of the summoning of demons, but angels can be summoned too. In fact, a certain well-known ritual magician famously undertook an elaborate ritual to summon his guardian angel. This ritual is known to have ultimately been left unfinished, and the carelessness of it left a convenient back door to Scotland for any demon wishing to do a little bit of scenic menace in the highlands. But contrary to popular belief, the message actually did reach his guardian angel. The problem is, simply, that when Aziraphale received a message in his tea that read “go to Crowley”, he understandably misunderstood. So, while Aleister Crowley lost control of his life, the demon Anthony Crowley shared a nice lunch out with his best friend, and wondered what the occasion was.

Crowley was always grateful that he’d never held rank in Hell, since they were the ones most likely to be called upon. Of course, he was always at risk of being pulled in by a more broad, general summoning spell. But for thousands of years he’d managed to skirt the issue entirely.

Until today.

“Oh, shit,” Crowley hissed. “Not no--”

He snapped out of reality, for the moment.

The ring box clattered to the seat and snapped shut.

When Crowley manifested again, it was in a large, dark room. He stood at the center of an elaborate summoning circle, his head spinning. He thought these things were usually done in chalk or salt, but whoever these people in their dark robes were, they were serious enough to have carved it into the concrete. Crowley sighed and ran his hands down his face. “Bloody ridiculous, I can’t believe…” he mumbled into his palms. He hoped this wouldn’t take long, he had a proposal to get to.

“Announce yourself, demon,” spoke one of the persons gathered there. He had sharp eyes and a sharper beard, and a length of wrought iron chain hung around his neck and no one else’s. Clearly, he believed he was someone important, and the others in the room probably did too.

Rolling his eyes, Crowley took a knee, like he’d heard you were supposed to. “I am the Demon Crowley, Formerly of the First Circle of Hell, Serpent of Eden and… something, something. Look I haven’t had to rattle off the titles in a while.”

“Rise, demon,” said the man in the chain.

Crowley sighed. “Oh, well,  _ thank you _ for your  _ permission _ ,” he drawled, and stood. “Listen, I don’t know what you’re looking for. I can do… knowledge. A bit. I can do temptations, deceptions.” He shrugged rather broadly. “If you need anything big, I regret to inform you that Hell isn’t exactly taking my calls anymore, so my options are limited. You honestly might want to hang up and try again.” 

Surveying the rest of the crowd gathered, a couple dozen strong it seemed, Crowley noticed that some of the robed figures were, well, already disrobing.

Crowley recoiled slightly. “Oh. Oh, no, I’m sorry. Don’t do sex things either. A one-man demon, I’m afraid. Could give you the names of some demons who do, but--”

The man with the chain cut in. “You said that Hell is not responding to you?”

“Ah, yeah,” Crowley said, rubbing the back of his neck. It had been a source of pride for him before so he didn’t know why it seemed embarrassing now.

“So they have abandoned you?”

About half the room was naked now. Some others were gathering up some rope. Two were holding ornate blades.

“Bit of a rude way to put it,” Crowley said, glancing nervously between all of them. He backed up a few steps and bumped into an unseen barrier at the edge of the circle.

“So they will not come looking for you if you never came back?” The man in the chain smiled far, far too wide.

The entire room seemed to set upon Crowley all at once. He screamed, and he scratched at a wall he could not see until they dragged him back to the center of the circle and pushed him down. He tried to lash out, hissing, clawing. He managed to bite one person and was struck hard across the face in turn, knocking his shades clean across the room. They wrapped the rope around his wrists and ankles, and from the way it burned he could tell it was consecrated. It made him feel weak and dizzy. He tried to transform to his serpentine form, but the ropes wouldn’t seem to let him. Blades came at him from all angles, tearing at his clothes and nicking his skin. Panting, struggling, he managed to manifest his wings with great effort. He couldn’t get through the edge of the circle, but in his desperation he wondered maybe, if he could just get airborne…

But four or so people took hold of his wings, gripped them tight, spread them wide. They twitched as Crowley struggled to take flight all the same, but it had been centuries since he’d flown. Then. Then he felt the blade press against the base of his wing. “Don’t,” he choked out, his yellow eyes wide. “Don’t you dare.”

It dug into the delicate, tenuous, barely-there flesh of his wing. Crowley screamed and tried to dismiss them, but whatever was happening here, he didn’t seem to be in full control of his body anymore. He howled in pain as two people set about messily sawing and hacking off his wings with blades that definitely weren’t meant for the cutting of flesh, sinew, and bone. They  _ tore _ . His vision went blank white from the agony of it for a moment, and when it cleared, he watched them cast his broken wings aside, where a few people set about busily collecting feathers and carving flesh from bone. The stumps left behind quivered uselessly on his back. He sobbed and groaned. Someone else was holding a vial to his back, collecting his blood.

“Now remember,” their leader called out. “As long as it stays in the circle, it is ours. It is our duty to achieve true dominance over evil by subjugating the wicked creature.”

Trembling, Crowley tried to squirm and writhe away from the people who were holding him down. “Don’t do this,” he said. “This is mad. You can’t. You can’t.”

But someone grabbed him by the hair and pushed Crowley’s face into the ground. With their free hand they gripped his hip to get him into position. They forced their way into him without a moment’s preparation, and Crowley squealed, actually squealed, and felt a rush of shame at the sound, at the pain and the feeling and the position he was in. Trapped, he was trapped with these people. And for all his power, there was nothing he could do.

He thought of Aziraphale, waiting for him at home, as he lay here being violated, shockwaves of pain rolling up his spine. Aziraphale waiting for a proposal that wasn’t going to come. Was he going to see him again?

Someone else took hold of his hair then and pulled his head up. A dick pressed against his mouth, and when he tried to turn his head away, someone snarled, “Suck, and don’t you dare bite, or I’ll take one of your beastly eyes.” And with the tip of a blade now resting against his lower eyelid, Crowley was forced to believe it. So he did as he was told. He did it because maybe, maybe, if he was very good, if he did what they wanted of him, he would be allowed to leave, he would be allowed to go home, and see Aziraphale, and maybe find a way to ruin these people for what they’d done.

Maybe. But as he was taken from both ends he got a look around at all the people waiting to get their turn with him. A terrified sickness settled in his belly. Were they really  _ all _ going to do this? He wasn’t sure his corporeal form could handle that many assaults. It might actually kill him. And then what would become of him? 

“And don’t for a second forget,” spoke the man in the chain, “that this is not a person. No matter what it says, no matter what it does. This is not a person. It is evil incarnate. And we will break it to our will.”


	3. III: The Light at the End of the Tunnel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everybody. It's going to get worse before it gets better. Hang in there, take care of yourselves.

Inside the circle, the cultists had complete control. Just as Crowley found he could not reliably change his form, he found that they could change it for him, adjusting how his genitals presented to suit their will. Everyone took their turns forcing themselves on him without a trace of guilt. Why should they feel badly? As far as they were concerned, he was a thing. Worse than a thing, a symbol. A symbol of something to be destroyed. And so they meant to destroy him utterly. 

Threats didn’t work. Crowley discovered that very quickly. He tried to draw on his menacing demonic aura, letting them know how sorry they’d all be, how he’d make them pay for this. But he was out of practice with menace, he’d let himself be tender for too many years now. Besides, it was hard to convince someone you were a threat when you were completely at their mercy and your voice couldn’t stop breaking. Not only were they not threatened, but they would beat and strangle him when he tried. So he stopped trying.

Sometimes they took a break from raping him. This was not a mercy. They seemed to like to collect things from him for whatever magical purpose they must think they had. So far they had ripped out clumps of his hair, pried off his fingernails and toenails. But their favorite was to bottle his fluids. They pressed vials up to his eyes when he wept to gather his tears as best they could. They cut into his skin for blood, sometimes even drilled holes like they were boring a tree for sap. Humiliatingly, they had gathered some of his come too. This hit Crowley hard not only because of how disgusting it was, but how degraded and ashamed he felt that they had managed, more than once, to make him orgasm. It didn’t matter how many times he told himself it was an automatic reflex of his physical form, it still made him feel like he was cheating on Aziraphale.

Aziraphale. It was impossible to tell how long Crowley had been gone from him, locked away from the light down here and lost in a haze of pain and shame. Especially because at one point, Crowley had passed out, terrified that this was it, and he was going to discorporate. If he did, if he showed up back in Hell now after everything, he felt fairly sure they weren’t going to just hand him a new body and let him go. No, he probably wouldn’t see the Earth again. It would break Aziraphale’s heart, and that was unacceptable. And Crowley would likely be tortured besides, but suffering so deeply permeated his reality right now it didn’t feel like a real consequence. So when he regained consciousness, finding that the cultists had left him alone in his prison a while, probably waiting for him to wake up so he would be aware of what they were doing to him, Crowley made a resolution. He had to survive. He had to make it home to Aziraphale. There was no other option.

So he set his demonic wiles to work. He studied the cultists when they returned, did his best to focus even as they forced his legs apart to fuck him. Between the revulsion and the pain and the humiliation, he honed in, searched the crowd for whoever was the weakest willed, the most doubtful, the most pliable. He could see it on people the way Anathema could read auras. Maybe it was the same thing bent to different purposes, he honestly wasn’t sure. Hard to shake your upbringing and all. It helped dull the pain to have a goal, a purpose, a plan. 

It was when one of the cultists took to bandaging Crowley’s cuts that he found his target. It wasn’t that he was foolish enough to think this person was doing him a kindness; they all just wanted to keep him alive as long as possible so they could keep using him. But he could see a nervous flicker in the young man’s eyes, the way his hands moved more gingerly over Crowley’s body than the rough-handed forceful grabs of others. He had reluctance. Not a great deal, but just enough for Crowley to get in. The serpent in Crowley’s heart found its way to the surface. He craned up and whispered, “Your name. What is it?”

The young man hesitated mid-wrap, then resumed bandaging. “The officiant says I musn’t answer your questions,” he said.

Of course he had. “Well, that’s alright,” Crowley said. “I’m Crowley. Or Anthony, if you want. Took a human name a while back, made living on Earth easier.” 

Blinking, the young man tied off the bandage. “...Anthony isn’t a very demonic name,” he said.

It was working. Crowley had his interest. “Wasn’t supposed to be,” he said. “Was supposed to be a person’s name. I really have tried my hardest for thousands of years to be a person. You’ve all rubbed off on me, it’s why Hell cut me loose. They said I was too much like you.” Humanize himself, that was the goal. Get at least someone here to see him as at least a living creature, maybe even a real actual person. “Because I like music, because I like my car and fine wines, because I like sitting back and seeing whatever it is humans will create next. Because I make friends, and keep them.”

“I… should probably go,” the man said, and gathered up his things hastily.

And, sensing his window closing very rapidly, with a jolt of desperation in his chest, Crowley blurted out, “Please, I just want to see him again.”

The man hesitated, crouched and ready to stand, but he squinted at Crowley. “Him?”

Crowley hadn’t meant to do it, hadn’t meant to bring up Aziraphale so quickly. It might be a risk. But right now it was the only foot he had in the door out of here. “There’s someone I love very much,” he said. “I’m sure you don’t think that’s possible but I swear to you it’s true. He’s my starlight in the dark. He’s everything to me. And we don’t know any other immortals, so if he loses me, he’s alone, and I don’t know what he’ll do.” Crowley hadn’t meant to start tearing up either, but it was a nice touch.

“What’s his name?” the man asked.

But Crowley knew better than that, even desperate. “No,” he said. “If I give you his name you can call him. And if you call him, you can hurt him.”

Despite Crowley’s reluctance to answer, he could see that there was a glint of belief in the young man’s eyes. That, and a spark, just a spark of uncertainty. But that spark could become a flame of defiance. Crowley watched him go, and hoped that fire would take while he still had time, before these people fucked him to death.

***

Crowley hadn’t come home.

At first, Aziraphale wasn’t too worried. The promise aside, perhaps Crowley had just gotten carried away with temptations. Or maybe he was still picking a ring, which made Aziraphale’s heart giddy with anticipation. So he decided he would be patient, and he would wait. He brewed up some tea, put a Rachmaninoff record on the record player in Crowley’s--no, their--flat. Although if they were getting married, perhaps they should get a proper house. So he spent a solid 45 minutes struggling to figure out how to use Crowley’s tablet and make it show him house listings. Finally he gave up, went out, got the print classifieds, and came back.

And Crowley still hadn’t come home.

A nervous knot tied itself in Aziraphale’s stomach. He picked up Crowley’s desk phone, the one attached to the old antique answering machine, and tried dialing his mobile phone. But there was no answer. Aziraphale bit his lip, wary. But he resolved not to panic. If he panicked, he was sure Crowley would show up, and he would give him a terrible ribbing for making such a fuss. Well, maybe he should panic, in that case, maybe it would summon him home. Crowley always did have a way of showing up just when Aziraphale needed him the most.

But Crowley still hadn’t come home.

It was dark out. It had been dark for some time. Aziraphale tried calling their friends, to see if they had seen Crowley. But the children, all of them just getting ready for bed, hadn’t seen him. Tracy and Shadwell hadn’t seen him. Newt and Anathema hadn’t seen him, and Anathema, for her part, sounded a bit worried too that Aziraphale even had to ask around about him. He promised her that it would be fine, and he was sure he’d show up soon. He wasn’t sure. He kept staring at the door and tensing at the slightest sound. Aziraphale wasn’t sure what the next step was. You couldn’t exactly file a missing person’s report on a demon.

What if Hell had come to collect him at last? What if they had given up on neutrality and gathered up their lost sheep to slaughter him? Or worse than slaughter. It was a possibility that always crept along the backs of both their minds, that they would occasionally discuss in hushed tones. What if, when Heaven and Hell figured out the ruse, as they most certainly would, they came back for them? But if Hell came for Crowley, wouldn’t Heaven have come for him?

The dawn was breaking, and Aziraphale realized he’d spent the night clutching a now very cold cup of tea and staring at the now silent record player. He’d spent all night worrying. He needed to do something besides worry. So he grabbed his coat and headed for Mayfair, the last place he was sure Crowley had gone. 

Aziraphale wasn’t sure if he was relieved or terrified when he found the Bentley still parked, empty and waiting, along the side of the street. At least now there was a certainty something was wrong, because if Crowley had left here at all, it hadn’t been on his terms. Aziraphale’s breath shivered as he waved away a ticket on the windshield and opened up the door. He didn’t need a key and wasn’t sure even Crowley knew what had become of the keys to the thing. He slipped in to sit in the passenger’s side just to think--wouldn’t dream of sitting in the driver’s seat, wouldn’t even think of it. But that was when he saw it.

The ring box.

The smallest “oh” fell from Aziraphale’s lips as he gingerly reached to pick it up. Crowley had gotten it, he’d gotten it for him and… then what? What had stopped him from bringing it home to him? Aziraphale’s thumb lingered on the lid. But he hesitated to open it. Did he really want to see the ring Crowley had chosen for him like this? Without being able to look in his beautiful golden eyes and hear him ask the question? With him possibly in danger somewhere? Or possibly…

Aziraphale sobbed and dropped the box to the floor. “Where are you?” he whispered.

There was a hum and a crackle as the Bentley’s dash blinked to life, as the radio sputtered and tuned itself. He heard the familiar voice of that singer Crowley seemed to like so much. “ _I want to break free, I want to break free…_ ”

Aziraphale froze and stared at the radio. He’d never been quite sure the extent to which Crowley had a telepathic connection to his car, to which the car was an extension of him in turn, to which it was permeated with his demonic magic. But tentatively, Aziraphale asked, “You’re trapped? Where are you?” He swallowed as the radio only spat static back. Maybe this was very stupid, but he was so afraid and he didn’t know what else to do. “Are you in Hell?”

The radio sputtered and flickered. “ _\--of the world--_ ” It fuzzed out a moment longer, then piped back in. “- _-I come from London town--_ ”

Gasping, Aziraphale sat up straighter. “So you’re still in London, then? Or near it?” He was sure the Bentley lacked the language to give him a direct address. He laid a hand gently on the dashboard, sniffling, shaking. Maybe, somewhere, Crowley could feel it, and it would give him some comfort. “I am going to find you. Please hold on.”

“ _Didn’t mean to make you cry…_ ”

Aziraphale couldn’t help but laugh a bit, and wiped at his eyes. “I know, I know.”

The radio flickered again. “ _When I’m not with you, think of you always…_ ”

“Me too,” Aziraphale whispered. Maybe this was mad. Maybe the car was just responding to him and his mental state, in Crowley’s absence.

The radio dimmed, just a bit, crackled. “ _Inside in the dark, I’m aching to be free…_ ”

“I’ll be there soon,” Aziraphale promised, whether Crowley could hear him or not. He took a deep breath and stepped back out into the world. A small miracle would ensure that everyone would quite ignore the presence of the Bentley until its proper owner was returned to it. 

Now, Aziraphale didn’t exactly know where he was meant to start. But he knew someone, he thought, who could help him try.

***

Crowley felt cold. He wasn’t sure if it was the room or if his body was just getting sick and weak from the mistreatment. Sometimes his ears rang while he was being raped and he wasn’t sure what that was a sign of. He was in and out of consciousness. Not always quite passing out, but sometimes losing track of himself, his mind settling into a detached haze, awareness retreating into itself. A bit like being drunk, but without any of the pleasurable effects. The altered consciousness of pure survival. 

He just had to ride it out. Had to live long enough to see Aziraphale again. He couldn’t die on him, wasn’t allowed to. In fact, at one point he could almost swear he could feel Aziraphale’s hand on his shoulder, bracing him. Maybe that was just another sign of him losing his mind.

At some point, Crowley became vaguely aware that the raping and beating and cutting had stopped, and instead the gathered company were standing nearby, discussing… something, probably him… in hushed voices. He squinted at them uncertainly. What awful new pain were they going to bring upon him now? Hopefully he could still blank out for it. That would be nice.

Their leader, the man with the chain, walked over to him, and Crowley tensed. For all that had happened, the leader had not yet once laid a finger on him. He wasn’t really sure what to make of that. Maybe he thought of himself as above it all. Or maybe he was saving the worst for last. But now, in his shadow, Crowley simply lay, despondent, and waited for his punishment.

“You grow weary, vile creature,” the man observed.

“You think?” Crowley snapped back, and scoffed. 

“Perhaps we have yet crushed the essence of your being out of you.”

“Will you let me go if you have?” Crowley said, but there was no hope in his voice, more of a wry acceptance. 

“We will release you, in a sense, yes.” The man in the chain reached into his long, dark cloak then, and pulled out an ornate crystal decanter. Inside, clear liquid slung about, catching the candlelight.

Crowley felt colder. The clouds in his mind cleared and a terrible weight slid down into his gut. He tried to sit up, at least insofar as his bonds and the pain in his ass and thighs would allow. “Is that…?”

The man didn’t say anything, only uncorked the bottle.

A horrified tremor started in Crowley’s shoulders and radiated across his body. He was cowering at the man’s feet, staring up at the glistening crystal of the vial. “No,” he said. “Please, don’t do this. What, are you bored of me? I can do better. I can. Give me another chance.” He’d made a promise. He’d made a commitment. He wasn’t going to die here. He was going to see his beloved again.

The man slowly started to tip the bottle. “We could all do with one less monster in the world,” he said.

And Crowley couldn’t even make himself try to get away. Where would he go? He only had a range of a couple feet in any direction he could make it to, and that by pained squirming and crawling. He saw the water pool around the mouth of the bottle. “Please,” he choked. “I don’t want to die.” He saw it begin to hang from the edge. “Don’t kill me. Don’t. Please.” He saw it fall, just as the tears ran from his own eyes. “Aziraphale--”

They say that your life flashes before your eyes in the moments before death. When you’ve lived as long as Crowley has, that comes with a nauseating dilation of time. Even then, he could barely keep up with it. He caught bits. The rise and fall of nations. Seeing London grow up all around him. The movements and generations of human music and technology. And Aziraphale, always there, always chasing a better good than Heaven could ever teach him. Aziraphale with his frumpy but well-loved clothes and his hedonistic ways and the way his whole face seemed to shine when he was at his happiest. Crowley wondered, in the split second before the water hit, if Aziraphale would ever be that happy again. After this.

The keening, wailing scream that came out of Crowley echoed through the tiny room, almost knocking a couple people off their feet. It was a grief for a life stolen, a life that he had fought so hard for but would not get to live. He braced himself for the burning pain.

But the pain did not come.

Hyperventilating, quivering, water dripping from his red hair, he stared up at the man above him in plaintive confusion. He was still waiting for the burning to start, even though he knew it should have already. 

The man sneered down at Crowley, then turned to the others in the room. “I am terribly disappointed in all of you,” he said. “You call this true dominance? It still has a sense of self-preservation. It still wants to live. If we are to claim true power over this evil, it must be destroyed utterly. Physically, sexually, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. Only then can we let it die.” He cast the bottle to the ground where it shattered at Crowley’s side and made him flinch.

Water. Just regular water. They were toying with him the whole time. He wished the thought of that would give him a renewed sense of purpose, that it would invigorate his fighting spirit. Mostly it just made him feel sick and vulnerable and powerless. 

The leader of these cultists was marching out of the room. “Get to work,” he growled. “Break it.”

Off to one side, Crowley saw the young man he’d been talking to earlier. The young man was curiously mouthing a word. Crowley recognized the shape of that word on anyone’s mouth instantly.

Oh. Oh, no. No. He’d spoken Aziraphale’s name. He’d spoken Aziraphale’s name in front of these people.

He had neither time to fully process his mistake, nor to catch his still short, shallow breath. Three people descended on him at once. They forced a vagina into position on him, took him in every hole he had available, quick, rough, one man’s hands closed around his throat. And the pain and the panic left Crowley dizzy. 

Even if he survived this, Crowley wondered, and even if he hadn’t foolishly sold Aziraphale out, what would the point even be? If he made it home to Aziraphale someday, what was going to be left of him?


	4. IV: Speak No Evil

Crowley wasn’t going to see Aziraphale again. He had to accept that. He couldn’t allow himself to hope, because the hoping made it worse. Honestly he wasn’t sure why he had ever expected anything more; God’s entire design for Crowley was to suffer, it seemed. His only regret was not being able to say goodbye after all this time. His only wish was that the grief didn’t destroy Aziraphale, that he found some way to get by, and that he didn’t go groveling at Heaven’s feet for forgiveness just to not be alone. He deserved so much better than that cold comfort. 

They were going to kill him, these people. Honestly Crowley wished they would just get it over with. Ever since the false execution, they’d taken to flicking water at him just to see him flinch. And they would laugh at him. It was humiliating. He’d beg them to let him die already, but he knew enough to know that whatever he asked for, he only would get the opposite.

At least the pain was less, lately. Crowley wasn’t sure if it was a side-effect of giving up, or if parts of his body were genuinely going numb. Exhaustion and nerve damage and all of that. Plus he was nearly mummified in bandages now, to the point where they became part of his bonds. It actually made it harder for them to position him as they desired for rape, which gave Crowley a dull sense of satisfaction. Oh, look, you broke your toy, now you can’t play with it anymore. 

The young man, as always, was there to give him more bandages, cautiously disinfecting wounds after someone had quite enthusiastically mauled the soles of his feet. Crowley was just trying to avoid looking at him.

After a moment of quiet, the young man softly asked, “So, Aziraphale?”

Crowley actually dry heaved a little from the sheer force of the wave of fear that overcame him. He’d hoped, foolishly, in the… hours? Day? In however long it had been since the faux holy water incident, he’d hoped the young man might have forgotten. Or he might not have parsed the name quite correctly. Or he might not have made the connection. “Please,” he wheezed.

“Please what?” The young man began winding bandages tight around his feet.

Closing his eyes tight against the tears, Crowley couldn’t stop himself. He knew. He knew asking for anything only meant he’d get the opposite. He knew begging was useless. But he had no options, no recourse, and nothing he could do to protect his love but plead. “Please don’t hurt him,” he whispered. His voice was raw and hoarse from the screaming he’d finally given up on. “I know. I know you want to ruin me. You want to take everything away from me. But don’t bring him into it, he’s too good for that. He’s an angel. Your lot isn’t about destroying angels, right? Symbol of perfect good or whatever? Don’t you touch him, don’t hurt him, he’s been through enough. I know you have complete control over me, I know there’s nothing I have to give. But I will do anything. I will do anything if you forget that name and you leave him alone.” He was shaking so badly the young man seemed to be having a hard time treating his wounds. 

“An angel,” the young man said in mild surprise, finally finishing up the last bandage.

Crowley sighed. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I got my evil all over him or what have you. But he’s not like me. He’s good, he’s so very good, he’s amazing.” 

“An angel is who you mean to marry?” He sounded so doubtful. Doubt in what? Crowley remembered a time when he could sense the minute differences between kinds of doubt like a sommelier assessing fine wines. It was all kind of a blur now. 

“Yeah. You could kill me to keep me away from him if you wanted,” Crowley said. “But don’t… punish him for having made the mistake of loving me. It’s not his fault, he’s just too naturally gifted at caring. Even for something like me.” Crowley shifted uncomfortably on the floor. He wanted the comfort of curling up tight like he could disappear into himself, but his bonds and his wounds and his aching joints and muscles wouldn’t quite let him move that way.

“Charlie,” the man said.

At that, despite the strain it put on his neck, Crowley managed to crane up to get a look at him. “What?”

“You asked my name,” the young man said, wringing his remaining bandages in his hands. “Fair’s fair. My name is Charlie.”

Confused, Crowley managed a slight nod. “Right. Charlie. I, ah, might say nice to meet you… but it’s not.”

Charlie almost laughed at that. But there was something in his eyes. He looked almost as scared as Crowley was. “This… this is wrong,” he choked. “I shouldn’t. No, I shouldn’t be doing this.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I really am very sorry about this. But there’s someone… I have to tell someone. I can’t keep this to myself, I have to tell, and I’m sorry.” He stood, bolting, stumbling out of the room.

Crowley’s heart hammered so hard it nearly choked him. “Wait!” he called after them, and his voice broke with the effort. “Don’t tell them!  _ Please _ don’t tell them! Please!”

Visions descended upon Crowley, disorienting and terrible. Hearing the sound of Aziraphale weeping, screaming, pleading. Seeing him bound and beaten and dirty on the floor. Seeing these monsters rip off Aziraphale’s beautiful wings and mercilessly fuck him and make Crowley watch. So many times over the millennia, Crowley thought he might be Aziraphale’s downfall someday. But this wasn’t how he’d expected it would turn out. Never anything quite this horrifying. It was his fault. It was all his fault. His love was going to destroy his angel, in the worst possible way imaginable. “I’m sorry, angel,” he whispered to the dark. He wished he’d been a better demon. He wished he’d never loved him at all. It would have been a colder, crueler, darker, more miserable existence. But it would have been worth it in exchange for Aziraphale’s safety. 

  
  
***

It was rather a mild day, but Aziraphale shivered all the same, trailing Anathema like a needy dog and watching her work. There was too much, Aziraphale decided, of London. There was too much town. If there were less of a town, less of a metropolitan area, maybe narrowing down this search would be easier. As it were, they had to break the city down in grids, doing sweeps. And they were only two people, besides. Couldn’t really form search teams for this. Just him, Anathema, a pair of dowsing rods, and a whole damn city. “It’s been over three days,” said Aziraphale, clenching and unclenching his hands for want of doing something, anything. “Maybe four. I can’t be sure when he was… taken.” He swallowed.

Anathema let out a deep, laborious sigh, staring down at the rods. “I’m trying, I am,” she said. “Any magic powerful enough to take and keep a demon should be powerful enough to get a quick fix on, but I’m having a hard time pinning it down. Might be they have protection.”

“He needs us!” Aziraphale stressed, coming around ahead of her. “Heaven knows what they’re doing to him! What if we can’t trace him because it’s already too late?”

Lowering the rods a moment, Anathema stared him down. “Listen, I might not have what you have with him, but he’s my friend too! I care about him, I want to find him, and I need you to believe that I’m doing everything I can!”

Aziraphale’s shoulders slumped, the weight of the situation pressing down on him. “I’m sorry, my dear,” he said. “I know you are. I simply keep thinking that… were our stations reversed… well, he always has a way of finding me when I need him the most. And now that I can’t do the same for him, I feel I’m failing him.” A stray tear got away from him, and he hastily wiped it aside.

Anathema smiled sadly and placed a firm hand on Aziraphale’s arm. “You’re not. I promise. You’re fighting for him, whether or not it feels like it.”

The tears were starting to well up too readily for Aziraphale to control. There were so many terrible images, so many imagined horrors that he kept banishing from his mind. He couldn’t focus on them, couldn’t think on them too long, it was too hard to imagine any sort of pain befalling Crowley. “He was going to propose,” he whispered. “We discussed it. We were going to get married. And I was foolish enough to believe that something that lovely could ever happen to me. That I could ever truly have something I wanted so badly.” He sobbed, stared intently down at his feet. “It feels like my fault. Because I have never, ever been allowed to have what I really want. It always gets taken away from me in the end. So of course, he did too. It’s what I get for being such a selfish angel. If I had left him well enough alone as I was supposed to, perhaps no harm would have come to him.”

Giving Aziraphale’s arm a quick squeeze, Anathema shook her head and took the rods back up. “No,” she said. “Not your fault. I won’t hear it. You both stood up for the Earth against everything you knew. That’s the opposite of selfish.” She squared her shoulders, let the rods hang loose in her hands, watching their drift, following where they pointed. She coaxed Aziraphale to follow her. “The least I can do in return is make sure you both see your wedding day. You deserve it.”

Aziraphale took a deep breath to compose himself and returned to following her. “I do believe it is you who we need to repay. But thank you, truly,” he said. 

“Thank me when we find him,” said Anathema. She paused a moment before crossing the street, glanced back to make sure Aziraphale was behind her. That’s when he saw her eyes widen. “Aziraphale? You’re… blurry.”

And here Aziraphale had thought the lightheadedness was just from the crying. He glanced down at his hands, saw how the outline of his body seemed to shudder and ripple. “Oh,” he said softly. There was a terror awash over him now. He could only imagine Crowley in the seconds before he was snatched up. Aziraphale looked back to Anathema, but it was hard to see her now, the world fading around him. “I believe I’m about to find him.” 

In the moment before he winked out of reality, he just barely felt Anathema try to grab onto him. But it made no difference.

  
  
***

Crowley was still weeping, tears staining the concrete, when the rest of the cult returned. He glanced up at them miserably, and was faintly, hollowly relieved to see they weren’t dragging Aziraphale along with them. At least, not yet. The young man, Charlie, wasn’t with them either. Maybe they had done away with him for listening to the demon. That seemed about these people’s speed.

“Despicable creature,” the man in the chain spat. “Does your evil and corruption know no bounds?”

“I know, I know,” Crowley whispered meekly. He’d ruined an angel. Of course he was the most monstrous thing they’d ever seen.

The man knelt down and grabbed Crowley’s patchy, ravaged hair, pulling his head up. “Your poisonous serpent tongue has done quite enough damage, I do believe.” He snapped his fingers. “Sit him up.”

As ordered, a pair of cultists came to prop Crowley up, since he wasn’t able to hold himself up under his own strength. Crowley simply cowered between them, his head hung low, not daring to look anyone in the eye. He wondered what they were going to do to him to prepare him for Aziraphale’s arrival. What state they were going to show him off in. How disgusting and pathetic was he going to look when his beloved finally saw him again, for the last time before they were both butchered.

Crowley cringed as the leader grabbed him roughly by the jaw and forced his head up. He seemed to inspect Crowley a moment, frowning thoughtfully. Then he held up a needle, with a length of black thread attached.

Eyes fixed intently on the glint of that needle, Crowley murmured, “What are yo--mmf!” 

The man grabbed Crowley by the lips, pressing them together, pulling. 

There was a sharp whine that came from Crowley even before the pain began.

Crowley shook, screaming deep in his throat, in spite of how raw he was from screams past. The man was taking his time, stitching Crowley’s lips together slowly, ever so slowly. It wasn’t even that this was the most painful thing they had done to him, it wasn’t by a long stretch. It was the degradation. It was the act of robbing him of one of the few shreds of his autonomy he had left. His power of speech might have brought terrible harm down onto him and his angel, but so much of him was already forfeit. But it was ridiculous to believe that he could have control over anything, even his words and his voice. Crowley was theirs completely. His body was theirs to shape and break and use. He understood now. What an awful creature he was. This was only just. The Fall had never been his punishment. This was. Some broken part of him was almost grateful that his traitor mouth had been put out of commission. If only it hadn’t been too late.

Finally, the man pulled to snap the thread in one last cruel flick of the wrist and smiled at his work. “There,” he said. “Try to open them, beast.”

Dutifully, Crowley did as he was told, and groaned at the sharp pain of coarse thread pulling at new wounds. His lips hardly budged, they were sealed shut tight.

“Good,” the man said. He went to tuck his thread and bloodstained needle away. And then paused. He was scrutinizing Crowley’s face again.

A chill sweat broke at Crowley’s temples and his breath heaved heavy. 

“Well, while we’re here,” said the man in the chain, rethreading the needle. “I don’t know why you ought to be allowed to see with those monstrous eyes, either.”

***

There was a vertigo that came with manifesting after a summoning. Aziraphale gripped his head and stumbled, although he could not make it very far. In fact, the circle he’d been summoned into was quite small, kept him hemmed in tight, and made him feel awfully claustrophobic. He found it was difficult to even lower his hands from his face, the way he was restricted. There were, he understood, protocols. You were meant to announce yourself, state your rank and station, ask what was required of you. That sort of thing. But Aziraphale was tired, and weary, and afraid, and his fiance was in danger, so he thought he could forgive himself if for once, just this once, he wasn’t willing to stand on ceremony. “Where is he?” he demanded sharply. “I know you have him. Show me to him at once.” He hoped the fact that he was on the verge of tears didn’t undercut his demands too badly.

But perhaps it was unneeded. He had expected some manner of grim ritual chamber, or perhaps a dark wood, or abandoned church. This was a very small, very cheap flat. The size of the summoning circle seemed to be less about constraining Aziraphale, and more about the spatial limitations of the kitchenette. Confused, Aziraphale peered around, searching for ominous occult forces. But all he saw was one weary and frightened looking young man.

“You  _ are _ an angel,” he said softly.

Aziraphale blinked at him, then frowned, frustrated. Maybe this was a coincidence. “My dear fellow, if you’ve need of the guidance of an angel, I sympathize,” he said. “But I fear I am terribly busy. There is something dreadfully urgent that needs my attention, and you must release me.” He glanced around at the chalk on the floor, tried to score the circle with his foot to let himself out, but it seemed to resist that. Of course it did.

“You’re looking for the demon Crowley,” the man said knowingly.

Not a coincidence. He knew. Desperately Aziraphale pressed himself against the barrier at the border of the circle. “Do you have him!?” he cried. “Where is he? Is he hurt?”

The man looked away, apparently unable to look Aziraphale in the face. He was shaking slightly, and wiping at his eyes. “He’s hurt. And I’m sorry. I was lied to. I didn’t know what I was doing. If you need to punish me, I understand. But I want to take it back, what I did.”

Aziraphale’s brow furrowed. “Lied to?”

“My officiant, the leader of my, um, my faith I guess.” The young man rubbed his arm. “He told us that destroying an evil creature would give us power over evil. That it wouldn’t be like a real person. That it wouldn’t have thoughts or feelings, that it would be evil incarnate and we could do whatever we liked to it. I just… I was supposed to help us keep it…  _ him _ … alive long enough that everyone could…” He bit his lip. 

Grief twisted inside Aziraphale. It was as bad as he had worried. Crowley was being tortured. Tortured by people who couldn’t see what it was that they had.

“I could tell he was afraid,” said the young man. “Like, really afraid. Not just faking it like everyone said. And he told me about you… I don’t think he meant to. That’s the thing of it. He was really upset with himself after he told me about you. So I believed him. I believed that he cared. And if he could care, and love, and fear, then… well, then the officiant was wrong. So I tried to talk to him about it. I hoped I could convince him we’d made a mistake, and he’d release him. But he slapped me. He told me I was an idiot for letting the monster get into my head with its lies. He told me to go home while they… fixed the problem.”

Aziraphale paled. “Do you think they’ve killed him?”

The young man shook his head. “Not yet,” he said. 

There was a bang then. Both men turned to look, and a copper rod flew across the room and struck the young man in the face. 

Anathema was standing in the doorway, breathless, the other dowsing rod in one hand and a knife in the other. “Release the angel immediately,” she ordered. 

“Anathema, it’s alright!” Aziraphale called. “He’s trying to help!”

“It’s fine, I deserved that,” said the young man, rubbing his cheek.

Still catching her breath, Anathema leaned in the doorway. “To be honest? Yeah, you did. I’m already missing one friend. I wasn’t about to lose two.” Gingerly she turned and shut the door she’d broken open.

The young man picked up the thrown dowsing rod, and handed it back to Anathema. “Well, if you’ll hear me out, and if you’ll trust me, I think I have a plan to set your friend free. If you’ll help me make sure I can make a clean break from what I’ve gotten myself tangled in.”

“Anything you need,” said Aziraphale. “If you help me get my Crowley back, I will do anything.”

Frowning, Anathema took the rod back. She stared at the man a long moment, looking around the edges of him. Finally she said, “Fine. I’ll trust you for now. But if you try anything, I’ll do whatever I have to to protect me and my friends.” Anathema came forward to break the circle, and Aziraphale crumpled against her for support when she released him.

Nodding, the young man cast a glance at where his robes hung on a chair. “Well,” he said. “Maybe I can prove myself and my loyalty to my coven if I come back with two new initiates.”   
Aziraphale smiled wryly at that. “Always did want to try my hand at a bit more acting,” he said. “Well… go on then. Lead us into the dark.” And deep in his heart, he held fast to the hope that he had left.  _ Hold on, my darling Crowley, _ he thought.  _ I will be with you soon. _


	5. V: Oblivion

Black was not Aziraphale’s color. He reflected on this as he drew his cowl down lower and followed obediently behind Charlie, the young man who’d summoned him, and the leader of this apparent cult. Anathema followed behind, watching his back. Aziraphale had tried his hand at wearing black a few times over the years, for formal occasions or for costumes. Every time he donned it, it put him in mind of mourning. That seemed particularly ominous now, considering the circumstances, and he tried to push the feeling deep down all the way to the base of his being where he could ignore it. He wondered how Crowley always managed to make it look so good. 

He’d already had to take another page out of Crowley’s book once today. It had taken some persuading to get the cult leader to bring on two new recruits and involve them in the ritual. So Aziraphale drew on the things he’d learned from Crowley, from the Arrangement. How to tempt people. You had to reach deep inside their feelings and find what they really wanted, and you had to tug at it just right to assure them they could have that if only they agreed with you. The experience had left Aziraphale feeling filthy and sick. Not because of committing the temptation, no, he was quite used to doing that sort of thing now. And he’d seen all sorts of darkness in the hearts of humanity in his day. No, the thing that sickened Aziraphale was the shape and the texture of this man’s desire. It was the feeling in the mind of a child who turns a magnifying glass on an insect out of raw curiosity, just to see what happens. To watch something burn without any regard for its life, and to enjoy it all the same. To not recognize something that lives as living, but as an object, lesser and fit to be destroyed. And Aziraphale wasn’t an idiot. He had moments of forceful, deliberate naivete. But he wasn’t an idiot. He knew that was how this man felt about his darling Crowley. And to get to Crowley, Aziraphale had to persuade the man that he was going to help destroy his captive creature, to reward that sadistic curiosity.

Now Aziraphale was following him, this wretched man. 

He reached behind him to Anathema, who silently took his hand to offer him comfort. 

At the hands of someone like that, Aziraphale couldn’t fathom what Crowley had been through. He couldn’t bear to think on it, but he would know soon whether he liked it or not. 

“Right this way, gentlemen and lady,” said the cult leader, coaxing them down a tucked away stairwell in an alley. It seemed like the kind of place one would take you for a drug deal, or something far more illicit and wretched. But Charlie followed confidently, so it must be the right place. “You are lucky, terribly lucky, to be joining our ranks now. If you’ve the will and the strength of stomach to truly conquer the darkness, of course.”

“Of course,” Aziraphale said softly. Perhaps, with his Angelic Grace, Aziraphale could persuade them to change their ways. At least one of them had already turned from this wicked path. He could get them to listen to him, and they would release Crowley willingly, and they would give up this life of evil and reform themselves. Then Aziraphale could walk Crowley home, heal him up, and all would be well. Everything could go back to normal then. And he could finally marry the love of his life, the person he’d longed for for centuries, for centuries far longer than he’d even let himself recognize. “And you are… sure this creature is what you say they are?”

“Positively,” the cult leader agreed. He got out a flashlight, which felt an oddly modern touch against his arcane garb, and led them down where the underground corridor grew darker. “It is full of lies and deceit. It is the very Serpent of Eden, by its own admission. It is the originator of the most ancient of sins. Can you imagine, then, what it says of our strength when we destroy it?”

“If they are deceitful, how can you be sure they truly are the Serpent of Eden?” Anathema asked, pulling in close behind Aziraphale.

The way the question seemed to prod a hole in his thinking visibly rankled the cult leader. He squared his shoulders and snapped, “Never you mind that. It is beholden to certain rules. The ritual reveals things to us. You will see when you see it. You will see that it is evil incarnate.” 

“And how, pray tell, do you recognize evil in a creature?” Aziraphale pressed. “Did they attack you? Did they threaten you with harm? Did they try to manipulate you?”

“You will  _ see _ ,” the leader insisted, only louder.

Aziraphale let it drop for the moment. If he kept at it he might compromise the fragile temptation that had gotten him invited here in the first place.

Instead, Aziraphale tried to prepare himself for whatever state Crowley might be in at the moment. He might be bound. He might be bruised. He might be burned from consecrated objects. He might be enraged, or in tears. Aziraphale made sure to keep his face obscured as possible, head low as they made their way through the doors, so that Crowley would not immediately recognize and call out to him, giving him away.

When they came into that candlelit room, Aziraphale immediately tensed, his stomach growing tight. It stank of monstrous evil in here. Evil, and something else. Something that his mind would not quite let him place.

Behind him, he heard Anathema stagger to a halt. “Oh my god,” she said, quiet and strained.

Aziraphale forced himself to look.

Half the people in the room were stark naked. Someone was sharpening a knife and eyeing their prize hungrily. A shelf contained bottles and jars of blood and other repulsive substances. Off to the side, a few people actually played cards, and laughed and jeered, as though this were some sort of party, in contrast to the grotesque ordeal happening at the center of the room. 

Crowley lay on the floor. For a moment, in horror, Aziraphale thought Crowley might be dead. Except that wouldn’t make sense, as he wouldn’t leave a body behind. But he was pale as a corpse, especially in contrast to all the dried blood which covered his skin and seeped through his bandages. His lovely auburn hair was patchy and torn. His hands and feet were mangled, and his wrists and ankles burned brilliant pink and red under consecrated ropes. Crowley’s beautiful black wings had been cut away. Not cleanly, they seemed to have been hacked and torn, leaving ragged stumps and clumps of tattered black feathers. And his mouth and his beautiful eyes. They were sewn shut. Sewn. Coarse threads were run through his lips and eyelids, thin trails of blood left down his face.

Someone was just finishing up riding Crowley’s dick. Being spent, they stood, slapped Crowley for good measure, and stepped away. Crowley didn’t even get a chance to catch his breath before someone else flipped him over and forced their way into Crowley’s bruised ass.

And Crowley whimpered. He actually whimpered, small and frail. In thousands of years of knowing him, Aziraphale had never heard such a sound from Crowley. He’d heard him scream, and yell, and whine, and cry, and groan. He’d heard the small, vulnerable moans Crowley made when Aziraphale made love to him. But this was something different. This was the sound of perfect, hopeless misery.

It was so much worse than anything Aziraphale could have prepared himself for. Crowley. Brave, witty, compassionate, thoughtful, caring Crowley. Here he was, lying on the concrete, raped, beaten, broken, humiliated, trapped and helpless. And it was the sounds, really. The sounds were what got to Aziraphale most. The wet frantic slap of rape, the hungry grunts and pants, the laughter and jeers of the disaffected, and the pitiful, muffled whimpers of the raped. 

This was what they’d done to his dearest Crowley.

A great deal is made of Angelic Grace and Angelic Mercy. For good reason, of course they’re a powerful force in the world. But when people think on the goodness and light of angels, they often forget about the sheer power of Angelic Wrath. Aziraphale tended to forget about his own capacity for wrath. He’d never felt particularly wrathful, even when he thought perhaps he was supposed to. He was a lover, not a fighter. If he could talk it out, or persuade someone, he would much rather do that. And while he could get frustrated or bitter easily enough, Aziraphale was generally slow to anger.

But they did this to his beloved Crowley.

It had never occurred to Aziraphale, in thousands of years, that it was not actually possible for him to lose the flaming sword. After all, it was granted to him by God Herself. It was meant for him. If ever he wanted it, he could have simply willed it to his side. Only, he never had wanted it.

Until now.

There was a terrible, brilliant light in that dark room.

Calling it a fight would be disingenuous. It was a slaughter. Later, Aziraphale would not recall a single second of it, though seconds was all it took. Under a minute, and every last rapist and rape enabler in the room was lying dead, and dozens of of heavy sword blows scored the summoning circle and broke its magic. Panting, exhausted, and only just coming back to full awareness of himself, Aziraphale beheld his work in terror. The sword fell to the ground with a clatter and dismissed itself, and Aziraphale cried out, hands to his mouth. All these people. He’d killed all these people, and without a second thought. 

Wait, Anathema. Where was Anathema?

But just as Aziraphale began to hyperventilate, he spotted her. She was cowering behind the steel door to the chamber with Charlie, having pulled him out of harm’s way. They both stared into the room in apparent shock. 

Why shouldn’t they be shocked? There was so much death here. And Aziraphale was a murderer.

Aziraphale crumpled to his knees beside his sword and threw up. 

Wiping at his mouth with a shaking hand, he looked to his companions in tears. He opened his mouth to say he was sorry, that he didn’t know what came over him. But all that came out was a sob.

It was echoed by Crowley.

Aziraphale answered it like a call. He had to forget about what he’d done for now, for Crowley’s sake. He ran to his side and, without thinking, gathered him into his arms.

This drew a muffled scream from Crowley. He tensed in Aziraphale’s grip.

Aziraphale blanched. “No, it’s me, it’s alright, my dear,” he said.

For some reason this didn’t seem to reassure Crowley. He began to sob.

So Aziraphale swallowed and tried again. “They’re gone,” he said. “You’re safe. I’m here and no one’s going to hurt you.”

Crowley was still shaking very badly, but at least some of the tension seemed to go.

Gingerly, carefully, Aziraphale laid his fingers over Crowley’s eyes and focused. The threads unwound, and tiny pinprick wounds closed. But even when they were free, Crowley kept his eyes shut tight. Aziraphale took care of his mouth next, a small miracle freeing and healing his lips. “I… don’t know if I can heal this all at once,” he confessed. “But I will. I will heal you, and I will take care of--”

“Kill me,” Crowley choked out the moment he could.

Aziraphale stared at him. “Beg pardon?”

“Kill me, please, kill me,” Crowley frantically begged, squirming in his arms. “Finish me off, I need to die, I’m not supposed to live.”

Slowly, Aziraphale shook his head. “Nonsense. I don’t want to hear another word of it.” He tenderly ran his fingers through what was left of Crowley’s hair. Crowley always used to like when Aziraphale would toy with his hair, it made him relax. Now it made him cringe, so Aziraphale reluctantly withdrew. “I’m here to bring you home, my love.”

“Don’t love me, don’t do it,” Crowley babbled. “I’m a monster. I’m disgusting. Kill me.”

Aziraphale stifled another sob. He’d had, perhaps, very romantic notions of what saving his fiance would look like. To swoop in, the dashing knight, and gather up his damsel in distress, leaving behind a wake of baffled villains while his beloved kissed him in relief and gratitude. But that was the sort of thing that would be in one of the fanciful tales of chivalry that stocked his fiction shelves. This was reality. And reality was often cruel. Which is why he now knelt here surrounded by corpses, his friend staring at him in horror, and the love of his life pleading for death. 

“I won’t do it,” Aziraphale whispered. “You’re… hurt. It’s the pain talking. It’s those wretched people talking. Come. I’m going to bring you home, and you’re going to rest it off.” Aziraphale stripped off his robe and wrapped it around Crowley to protect what remained of his dignity, if anything at all. Then he scooped him up from the dirty ground and cradled him close. He felt so small and fragile right now. Crowley had never felt so fragile in his arms before. Aziraphale thought that the slightest wrong move might shatter him. He couldn’t meet Anathema’s eyes when he approached her. “Would Newton come to give us a ride if we asked?” he said. “I don’t believe we can take the bus in this state.”

“Of course he will,” Anathema said. “Come on, we all need to get out of here.” Aziraphale was grateful at least that she managed to keep the mortification out of her voice. She led the way back to the corridor. 

Charlie didn’t say anything at all. Aziraphale couldn’t blame him. He might not have agreed with them, but he knew these people. Well, Aziraphale had promised him a clean break, hadn’t he? Now there was nothing left to break from.

Oh, Lord help him. All those people.

They waited in the low light of the mouth of the corridor for Newt to arrive. Charlie had seen himself off, walked back to his flat alone, needing the space. Aziraphale was doing his best to patch up the worst of Crowley’s wounds before he got there. It was hard. There were scars on top of scars on top of scars. At least Crowley had either fallen asleep or gone unconscious, so that he no longer begged to be killed. Aziraphale couldn’t stomach much more of that. “If you never want to see me again after today,” he whispered to Anathema, “I will understand completely.”

“Don’t,” Anathema said. She was pressed against the wall, hugging her knees, staring up into the light. “I’m not upset with you. You did what you had to do to save and protect someone we both care about.”

“I could have stopped,” said Aziraphale, gently taking Crowley’s hands in his and watching the fingernails regrow. Maybe he could get him some nail polish. Maybe doing a bit of self care and preening would help him feel better. He always did like to look nice.

“From the look of you, I’m not sure you could have,” said Anathema. “I’m not sure you knew what you were doing.”

Shoulders quaking slightly, Aziraphale gave voice to the anxiety between them. “I could have killed you.”

“But you  _ didn’t _ ,” Anathema stressed. “You saved Crowley. That’s all that matters.”

Looking him over now, Aziraphale wasn’t honestly sure he  _ had _ saved Crowley. Not yet. The people back in that room might be gone, but their torture of Crowley was hardly done. It was simply that the rest, Crowley was going to take care of himself. It would roll forward in perpetual motion. And Aziraphale wasn’t sure he knew how to help him stop it. 


	6. VI: Living Dead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! I have updated the tags with additional warnings, most importantly the inclusion of a warning for some suicidal ideation, which does come up in this chapter. Please be mindful, thanks. It's going to take a while for things to get any better so buckle in.
> 
> Also, thank you everyone for your wonderful comments. I'm probably going to go back through just... weeks and weeks of comments on all my fics at some point and reply where I can. Sorry, I have the social anxieties! I probably won't get be able to reply to everyone but I'll try to reply some. But truly, thanks for commenting, kudos'ing, or just reading in general. You're all stars.

Crowley slept restlessly for days, for weeks. He had half a mind to sleep a whole century away, except he was fairly sure the nightmares wouldn’t let him. When he slept, he was still trapped, being torn apart, and no matter how painful, no matter how gruesome, he just couldn’t seem to die. Sometimes he could still feel the sting in his eyelids, and when he woke he was sure he wouldn’t be able to open them. He had to carefully check every time. 

The first few times he woke up, almost as disoriented as if he were drunk, Crowley had this inescapable thought. He thought that, if he was really out, maybe he could stagger down the aisle of a church to where they kept their holy water and then he wouldn’t have to hurt ever again, he wouldn’t have to live with the memory of what was done to him. And the world would be down one more demon. Two things stayed his hand from this. The first was that it would have been far more effort than he could muster; it was so much easier to just go back to sleep instead. The second was Aziraphale. 

It was one thing to long for death when he was alone in the dark with people who hated him and wanted nothing but pain for him. It was another when Aziraphale was close, when he could feel his angelic warmth and smell his scent, like vanilla and musk and black tea. Aziraphale wasn’t always there when he woke up, but he left traces of himself behind in the room. There were plants, not Crowley’s. Aziraphale didn’t approve of how Crowley raised his plants, you see. These were plants chosen instead for soothing. Lavender and vases of carnations and little aloes in charming little pots. There was Aziraphale’s profoundly old record player, but playing vinyls of Crowley’s favorite music. There were the hits of the 70s and 80s, but so too were there symphonies that Crowley rarely got to hear anymore because he kept forgetting them in the car. 

Once, during one of his brief moments of wakefulness between long sleeps, he heard him. Crowley lay, trying to decide if it was worth bothering to move or open his eyes. But beside him, at the bedside, he heard. Aziraphale was weeping, inconsolably. He was clearly trying to keep it down, bit back and half-muffled, to let Crowley sleep. But the sound was the most wretched thing Crowley had ever heard.

Crowley knew he couldn’t die because he couldn’t wrench more of that terrible sound out of Aziraphale. At the same time, he couldn’t shake the sense of guilt and shame knowing that crying was because of him. So he kept still and quiet, letting Aziraphale think he was asleep, and gave him the space to cry.

When he finally decided to wake up for good, he lay in bed a while, feeling the aches that still rattled in his body. It was nothing compared to the pain from before, of course, but it echoed it. Crowley stared at the ceiling, watching the slivers of light that crept through the blinds move. In the next room, he could hear Aziraphale’s voice. Crowley strained to catch words.

“...Yes, still… Well, I don’t know… Oh, no, no, it could be years… Yes… I know… Well if you wish to leave anything for him, I’ll make sure he gets it… Of course…”

Crowley sighed, and he stretched, and immediately regretted it, because every old wound seemed to roar to life. Oh, the marks weren’t there. But some pains linger long after the apparent damage is gone. He hissed, cringed, then forced himself to sit up all the same. Just to see if he could. He could. Nothing was holding him here. That was the first thing to get used to. Experimentally, he stretched each limb, each digit, feeling them move. They cramped up a bit with disuse, but he was slowly able to work the kinks out. Finally, he managed to swing his legs out of bed and let his feet touch the floor. His floors were hard, but they were hard in a way that was comforting and familiar. Smooth, not like raw concrete with grooves carved in. Aziraphale seemed to have dressed him up in satin pajamas, which was a nice touch. It felt good on the skin, made him feel less exposed. 

Seemingly on cue, Aziraphale crept into the room. Then, seeing Crowley awake and sitting up, his face positively glowed. “Good morning,” he said. “Well… afternoon.”

Seeing Aziraphale smile was the first thing that made Crowley feel even an ounce of gladness in a very long time. “Mh, hi. Whossat?” He ran a hand over his groggy face and back through his hair. It felt fuller again. The patches had grown back in.

Aziraphale’s brow furrowed, then relaxed. “Oh, on the phone? Anathema. She’s been worried about you.” He wrung his hands and stared at the lightswitch, contemplating it but ultimately not touching it. “How are you feeling?”

Well, Crowley was hurting, afraid, ashamed, and he wished he was dead. “Fine.”

He musn’t have sounded very convincing, because Aziraphale frowned. “If you want to keep resting, love, that’s completely alright.”

“No,” Crowley said, kicking his feet idly just to feel them move independently of each other. “How long have I been asleep?”

Aziraphale tapped at the air as though physically counting the time out on an abacus. “About… two weeks, three days.”

Crowley nodded thoughtfully. “Well, I’ve done worse.” He slipped his sleeve up to get a look at his wrist. Terrible pink burn scars criss crossed his skin, and he cringed.

“I’m sorry,” Aziraphale said, stepping closer. “I did my best to heal what I could, I really did, but some things resisted me.” 

Feeling a shiver roll through him, Crowley got out of bed. He brushed past Aziraphale, unbuttoning the pajama top, and made his way to his dresser and the mirror above it. “What do you mean?”

Behind him, Aziraphale finally flicked on the light, and Crowley squinted against the brightness. He wasn’t used to bright again yet. “It seems like I can’t use a miracle to heal anything divine,” Aziraphale said. “So… so the consecration burns. That will have to heal over on its own. And…”

Crowley wadded up the pajama top and cast it aside, and got a good look at himself in the mirror. God, he looked exhausted in spite of all the sleep. Eyes red-rimmed and shadowed, his whole face drawn. The scars from the ropes looked so brilliantly bright in the light. Like brands on his skin. Marking him as owned. And he reached frantically around his shoulders, felt up his shoulder blades, and stretched, and stretched, but his wings. His wings wouldn’t spread. He could still feel the stumps and the tattered broken feathers around them. Crowley cupped his hands around his mouth and tried to steady his breath.

“I’m sure they’ll grow back,” Aziraphale offered hopefully. “Just give them time.”

“No,” Crowley said, “no no no.” The laugh that came out of him surprised even him. He clutched his head tight around the temples. “They won’t come back. I don’t deserve them.”

“Yes you do,” Aziraphale said softly, just a little closer behind him. “And they will. Give it time. And even if they don’t, I will love you just the same, because you’re still you, with or without them.”

But Crowley was lost in a reverie of panic and disgust, feeling the awful tearing he’d felt when they were taken away from him. “Ground me. Take me apart. Take everything away from me. I don’t deserve it. I’m rotten, rotten.”

“Crowley,” Aziraphale said, softly.

There was a hand on Crowley’s shoulder.

\-- _ and on his arm and on his back, pulling him down, pinning him down, stripping him bare, ripping his wings, his beautiful wings, tearing them away, and tearing into him like meat, using him, fucking him, touching him all over _ \--

“Don’t touch me!” Crowley screamed. He turned on his heel in an all consuming fury and terror. His mouth full of fangs, his eyes full serpentine and alive with the instincts of both prey and predator. And he realized he had closed his hand around Aziraphale’s throat. To his credit, Aziraphale looked more saddened than afraid. But still, Crowley had gone for his lover’s throat. He recoiled immediately, falling back against the dresser. “Angel, I’m so sorry.”

“No, I am the one who should be sorry,” Aziraphale said, lightly rubbing at his neck. “I should not have touched you without warning. That was thoughtless.”

Crowley couldn’t contain it. It was all rushing in at once. There had been this thin veneer of Things Are Better Now. Now it was punctured, and all the Nothing Will Ever Be The Same was flooding in, and Crowley was drowning in it. He slipped slowly down the face of the dresser, crumpling to the floor, and sobbed. He curled forward and tucked his head between his knees, arms wrapped around himself, feeling so very small and so very delicate. Before, he could remember Aziraphale sliding up behind him, coiling his arms around him and kissing his neck, and he would be delighted with the surprise of his presence, would bare his neck to him to give him better access. That was gone now. So much was gone. He was on a sandbar and the ocean of his fears was around him eating away at what solid ground he had left to stand on. 

Maybe he hadn’t survived. Maybe he was dead, and whatever Aziraphale had brought home was Something Else now. The empty shell of the man Aziraphale had loved, wearing his face and his voice but having nothing of him left inside. “I’m sorry.” And he couldn’t stop apologizing. That was infuriating.

“It is quite alright,” said Aziraphale. “May I sit with you?”

Crowley barely nodded. Someone help him, his angel actually had to ask permission to even sit with him. How pathetic.

Aziraphale sat beside him, quiet, not touching him, just giving him the space to let his feelings out. Occasionally he would softly say something like “it’s alright” or “let it all out.” Mostly he just stayed there by his side.

“How disgusting I must be to you,” Crowley mumbled into his knees.

“No, never,” Aziraphale immediately said.

“Uncontrollably weeping like a child.”

“You’re hurt, it’s normal to cry.”

“Scared as a trapped rabbit.”

“You’ve been through so much. I hope you feel safe soon, but don’t be ashamed of your fear.”

Crowley peeked up at him. “I love you so much and now I’m afraid of even your touch.”

Aziraphale gave him a brave smile back. “And you could never touch me again from now to the end of the universe and I would love you just the same.”

“I want to touch you,” said Crowley.

Aziraphale looked him up and down uncertainly. “In the general sense, or now?”

In lieu of specifying, Crowley simply held out a hand. Aziraphale took it without a second’s hesitation, but now that Crowley was ready for it, it didn’t scare him. Now that he was asking for it. Crowley held Aziraphale so tight, thumbs grazing each other, fingertips digging into the back of his hand, but if Crowley was hurting him, Aziraphale showed no sign and didn’t say a word. He held onto his angel for dear life, and used him to pull himself back to safer ground and calmer waters. After a few deep breaths, Crowley sat up straighter, and looked Aziraphale in the eyes. “I really don’t deserve you.”

“You deserve the world, and everything it has to offer you,” said Aziraphale. He squeezed Crowley’s hand back. “I’m going to be here every step of the way, to make sure you feel safe being in it again.”

“I may never feel safe again,” said Crowley.

“Then so be it. I am not going anywhere.”

There was something, speaking of safety, that bit at the corners of Crowley’s mind and threatened to infest him. He shifted uncomfortably on the hard floor. Hard, too hard. Needed to get up. Reluctantly he let Aziraphale go and pushed himself up onto his feet. “What… happened? I don’t really remember. And didn’t really have full command of my senses.”

“Which part?” said Aziraphale. He remained anchored to the floor, staring up at him, and he was always fair, but seemed paler now.

That didn’t bode well. “When you got me out,” said Crowley. “What happened.”

Aziraphale shrugged and shook his head. He had that nervous, twitching smile. The kind he put on when he wanted to pretend everything was fine. “I got you out, that’s all that matters.”

Crowley gripped the edge of the dresser for balance, and to ground himself in the space, remind himself of where he was. He was home. He was in his own flat. He wasn’t trapped now. But. But. “Where did you send them? What happened? What if they come back from wherever you sent them to?”

“I can assure you they won’t,” Aziraphale mumbled, and dropped his gaze, not quite looking at Crowley.

But Crowley hardly noticed, he was pulling at his hair, threatening to rip out that which had only just grown back. “And what if some of them weren’t there that day? What if they had other branches? Angel, they have my name, and they have my blood, and my tears, and my…” He cut himself off. Couldn’t say it. Wouldn’t say it. He couldn’t let Aziraphale know he came for them. What would he think of him? “Angel they could call me back so easily and have me all over again. And… I…” He took a deep breath. “I said your name. I’m so sorry. I was weak, and I was stupid, and I said your name without thinking and I know at least one of them noticed.”

At that Aziraphale seemed to light up. “Yes!” he said. “There was a young man, Charlie. He called on me to bring me to where they were holding you. He helped me rescue you.”

The idea of that threw the brakes on Crowley’s panic train for the moment. His nose wrinkled and he frowned. “He… did?” He rolled the thought around in his brain, tasting it, getting a feel for it. “I… I’m sorry but I don’t forgive him. I don’t. Maybe he did the right thing in the end, and maybe he never touched me himself, but he stood idly by for days while people raped me. He kept me alive too but… I hate him. I still hate him, because he was one of them, and he helped them do it.”

“That’s alright,” Aziraphale said softly. “That’s fine. You don’t have to forgive him. You never have to see or hear from him again. But, if you are alright with it, I can ask him if there are any others. Anyone who might seek you.”

Crowley sniffed, trembled against the dark wood of the dresser, and the handles rattled. “Don’t let them take me back.” He held up his hands, stared down into them, and at the stripes of bright pink on his arms. “I don’t even know if it’s enough for them to be gone. Now I know… anyone can take me at any time. Thousands of years and I’ve never felt so powerless.” He almost half expected to see himself start fading. For the whole thing to start over again. 

“We will find a way to protect you, I promise,” Aziraphale said. He stood and held out his hand, a silent offer. “And I promise you… none of  _ them _ are ever going to come looking for you.”

“How can you be so sure?” Crowley asked, taking his hand and squeezing it. Feeling his skin and his warmth and letting it remind him he was here with his love and he was safe, at least, for now.

But Aziraphale would still not look him in the eyes. And Crowley wasn’t sure why. He held tight to Aziraphale all the same, hoping it was a comfort to him too. It was the least Crowley could do. After all, he’d become such a terrible burden on his angel.


	7. VII: Tethers

Crowley very much wanted to enjoy being out in the sunlight. He had thought he would enjoy it, after so long kept in the dark, and then subsequently asleep. He thought, and Aziraphale enthusiastically agreed, that the fresh air would do him good. Instead, he felt dreadfully exposed. He felt the way a mouse feels crossing a field, knowing a hawk could swoop down at any moment. Every single time a passerby gave him so much as a passing glance, he was sure somewhere in his gut that they had dark intentions for him, and then subsequently felt ridiculous and stupid for thinking it. What kind of a meek coward had he become? He might have fled back home if they didn’t have a job to do. “You said the Bentley’s safe?”

“I made sure of it,” Aziraphale promised, with a pleased little smile. “I took care of it for you. Made it so that not a soul would notice it until your return. As far as anyone is concerned, that parking space simply doesn’t exist.”

“Well the parking space didn’t exist until I got there either,” Crowley said, glancing both ways more times than was necessary before crossing the street. “So fair enough.”

Aziraphale jogged along at his side, wretched as always at watching where he was going. He was too busy watching Crowley instead. “It spoke to me, you know.”

Crowley scoffed at that. “Get off of it, no it didn’t.” He turned the corner and his heart skipped a beat. Well wasn’t he a sight for sore eyes? Good old Bentley. Crowley quickened his pace to get to it. 

“It did!” Aziraphale insisted, scurrying to keep pace. “Or, I think it did. Or I was losing my mind. But I swear to you, the radio turned on, and it tried to talk to me. I think perhaps there’s something of you in it. Some connection. I’m not sure I understand it.”

“I hope there’s something of me in it, I’ve had it nearly a century now.” He heaved a long, shivering sigh and laid his hand on the hood of it. “Hello…” A smile teased at the edges of his lips. This. This would set things in the right direction. His most prized possession, his again at last. To have something that was his, comfortable and familiar. After all, he’d been through so much in this car. It was his safe place. Tapping at the lock, it opened for him, and he slipped inside and caressed the wheel.    
  
Aziraphale slipped in to join him on the other side. “Oh,” he said. “And you left something. I promise I didn’t peek, but… here.” He leaned down to fetch something out of the footwell, and handed it over to Crowley.   
  
Crowley took the little box into his hands and stared at it.

There was a ringing in his ears and a buzzing in his head.

“Crowley?”

But Aziraphale’s voice sounded distant, as though through water. It was happening again. It was happening again. Everything looked blurry, and Crowley began to gasp and choke and panic. His hands scrabbled about, trying to find something to hang onto, not that it would do him any good. “No please don’t I can’t do this not again.” Finally, with a dramatic and uncoordinated flailing, he threw himself out of the car entirely, toppling out into the street. A last second miracle from Aziraphale pulled him out of the way of an oncoming car and onto the sidewalk. 

Sitting on the pavement, Crowley stared at his beloved Bentley. Then he let out a cry of rage and slammed his fist against the side of it. He wasn’t being taken. Of course he wasn’t. But this was where it had all started, right? “Bastards,” he snarled.

Cautiously, Aziraphale cracked open the passenger’s side door and slid out. “Are you alright?” he said.

Crowley looked up at him, simultaneously outraged and snivelingly miserable. “How dare they?” he said. “I thought, after all they’d taken from me, there was nothing else they could take for me. But now I can’t even sit in my car, let alone drive it, without feeling like I’m about to be stolen away? I hate this. Angel, I hate this so much. I just want to be me, I just want to be normal. But instead I’m all bloody fucked up to every edge of the universe. I’m ten pounds of loose broken glass in a sack, all sticking out the edges.” He noticed a bystander giving him a concerned glance and growled, “What are you  _ looking at _ ?” He flicked his snake tongue at them and, alarmed, they went about minding their own business like any proper English person. 

Aziraphale sat down on the pavement with him, leaned up against the Bentley’s door. “Give yourself time,” he said. “We have all the time in the world, my dear.”

All the time indeed. At the very idea of going on like this for ever, Crowley nearly choked. “Oh, lovely,” he drawled. “And until then I get to be this wretched burden on you, consumed with terror and misery about even the things that once gave me joy. Brilliant.”

“You’re not a burden,” Aziraphale said softly. “How long have we known each other? It means everything to me to be here for you.” He held out a hand, patiently.

And Crowley took it, of course he took it, it was all he could do. He squeezed tight and took a few deep breaths, evening himself out. When the nervous vibrations in all of his muscles started to ease, Crowley said, “I need something… some kind of assurance that it can’t happen again. That those people can’t take me, especially not if they’re still out there somewhere.”

Aziraphale gripped his hand tighter.

Crowley rubbed the back of his hand with his thumb without a second thought. “I need security. You never know how vulnerable you are until… until something like this…” He couldn’t complete the thought and settled for gesturing, vaguely, circularly in the air. A circle like the snare he felt around his neck.

“Well,” said Aziraphale, loosening his own grip but not letting go, “I think I might have a plan for that. Or we.”

“Who’s we?” Crowley pressed. He didn’t let go either. Couldn’t let go. Aziraphale was safety. Aziraphale was his strength.

“Anathema and I.”

It was the first time it had occurred to Crowley, really sunk in for him, that Anathema had been there. That she had seen him like that. Crowley scowled and blinked back the tears that burned in his eyes. “I don’t know if I can look Anathema in the eyes right now… but if she’s got a solution, I’ll hear it.”

“You’ve no need to be ashamed,” Aziraphale said. His free hand twitched, and Crowley knew he wanted to reach for him, but had talked himself down from it. “Anathema doesn’t think any less of you at all. She’s just worried about you, and she wants to help.”

“Yeah, worried about me, that’s the problem,” Crowley said. He reached out and gripped Aziraphale’s shoulder, braced himself on it and leaned in. “I can’t stand the idea of her worrying about me, makes me feel pitiful. Bad enough to have you worrying about me as is.” His arms fell slack to his sides. “How many people are worrying about me right now?”

Aziraphale frowned at that. “It’s… well, Anathema was… there. I am sorry about that, but I needed her help to find you. And, ah, Newton had to drive us home.”

“Newt knows!?” Crowley cried out, his voice cracking. He reached to grip the door handle of the Bentley. This close to it, it seemed like whatever magic was keeping people from noticing it also applied to him, which suited him just fine. He didn’t need people staring at him while he tried to grapple with the fact that so many of their friends knew how broken he was.

“Well would you have me call a cab and put you in a car with a stranger like that?” said Aziraphale. “Or carry you onto a bus in such a state?”

And what Crowley wanted to yell was yes, because they could make the strangers forget and he wouldn’t feel bad about it the way he would about doing that to a friend. But then he did feel bad after all. He felt the voices crawling around the edge of his mind telling him how irredeemably evil he was. So, defeated, he simply said, “Fine. It’s fine. Just. Just bring me to Anathema, angel. I want to hear her plan.” Even if she looked down on him right now, anything would be better than the terrified anticipation of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

***

The horseshoe over Jasmine Cottage let Crowley pass with little to no protest. Crowley felt this should have reassured him. Instead, the chorus in his head that decried his many evils assured him that he had even tricked the magic somehow, so deceitful and manipulative was he. It was getting truly annoying but he couldn’t quite disagree.

Anathema gave him such a sad smile when he entered and he hated it so. “Crowley, how are you feeling?” she said.

“Oh, just ducky,” Crowley crooned with a big shrug. “Top of the world, never better, peachy keen. A bastion of happiness and good health, me.”

When Anathema’s smile flitted away, Crowley found himself grimly satisfied, and hated himself for it. “I was worried, is all,” she said. “I apologize if I was insensitive, or prying.”

Crowley deflated immediately, his fragile guard broken. “You weren’t,” he sighed. ‘I’m just so sure you all think less of me,’ is what he didn’t say. He rubbed his arm. “I’m… bad, Anathema. I’m doing very badly, actually.”

“Well, hopefully this helps,” she said. She glanced nervously between Aziraphale and Crowley. “Now, I should explain the plan to you. It’s… not perfect. But it’s the only thing I could come up with that would guarantee you can’t be summoned.” She beckoned them to follow. There was an office space in the cottage that in theory Newt might have liked to use as a computer room. But that had never quite panned out. Now it was just a place where Anathema did magic when she needed to spread out. “I already have most of it set up just to be ready, but I want you to understand that if any part of this makes you nervous or uncomfortable, we can stop at any time, we can try again later, or we can just not do this at all.” She glanced back over her shoulder to smile at him, and Crowley tried to convince himself that it was encouraging, and not pitying. “Okay?”

“Mm, yeah. Mhm. Okay.” Crowley nodded. But he reached for Aziraphale’s hand all the same, and Aziraphale dutifully obliged. 

“What sort of magic are we talking about?” Aziraphale pressed, reassuringly running one finger along the side of Crowley’s hand.

“It’s a ritual,” Anathema began. She lingered at the door to the office, one hand on the door. “It does involve a ritual circle. Are you alright with that? I promise you can step out of the circle at any time. You will not be held by it.”

The idea gave Crowley a slight twist of nausea but he nodded. “Yes, alright.” He was willing to try anything if it would reduce the paranoid certainty that those people would find a way to call him back. Besides, he had to trust that Anathema would not trap him. Anathema was here to help him. Anathema had been there to help save him, as much as he hated that she’d seen him like that. Anathema would not hurt him. He repeated these things to himself as a mantra as he entered the room, but still choked and faltered at the sight of the ritual circle. It was smaller, with different symbols, and drawn in chalk on hardwood in a well-lit room. But it still was what it was, and Crowley hesitated, feeling the echoes of being trapped from the ache in his limbs and the pang of phantom pain in his missing wings.

Aziraphale lingered beside him and squeezed his hand to remind him where he was. “Do you need to stop?”

Crowley shook his head. He wanted to be brave. He was determined to be brave just for once today, for once this month, because maybe this moment of bravery would be the thing to truly set him free. He forced himself to step in. “Could we, ah, leave the door open?” He wanted to see his line of egress clearly if he needed it. Though the window in this office was also cracked, and there was a pleasant breeze.

“Of course,” Anathema said. She went to thumb through a tome left on a desk, searching for the right page. “So, I am going to explain the process to you. It’s possible that this solution might be triggering for you. If it is, please say so, and we won’t proceed.”

“Oh just get on with it!” Crowley snapped. “I’m fine!” He pulled free of Aziraphale and strode forward, planting himself in the middle of the circle. He spread his arms wide. “See? No problem, nothing to worry about.” Though his knees were quaking very badly. 

Anathema frowned uncertainly at him. “I just want to promise you, you’re in complete control here,” she said. “We can stop at any time before or during the ritual. Once the ritual is complete, it could theoretically be reversed, but it would be difficult, and it might take time. So I want to make completely sure you understand and are willing before we do this. Because this ritual is a binding spell.”

The burn scars at Crowley’s wrists and ankles started to itch and he winced. “What?”

“Not like that!” Anathema stressed. “It’s…” She swallowed, clutched her book to her chest. “The only way I could come up with that would guarantee no one could summon you was if you were already magically bound. We can bind your spirit to a place, a thing, a person, anything you want. You would not be able to be very far from what you’ve bound yourself to, unfortunately. But neither could you be separated from it.”

Crowley let the weight of this choice settle on him. He stared intently at the floor and the symbols that surrounded him. He would effectively be trapped. But it would mean no one could steal him away to hurt him. He could no longer disappear from anywhere at any time. It was a cold, cold security. But it was security nonetheless. He laughed miserably and plucked his shades off, pressing his face into his palms and wiping at his eyes. This wretched choice might be his only option, then.

He might have said to bind him to his Bentley once. But it was miserable to live in your car, and it clearly wasn’t the safe place to him that it once was. Maybe he could bind himself to the flat, put himself on house arrest. But that would be awfully grim. And he would never be able to go anywhere with--

Suddenly he dropped his arms, looking to Aziraphale with wide, manic eyes. “You,” he said.

“Me?” said Aziraphale, brows furrowed.

Fervently, Crowley nodded, and he pointed at him. “She said she could bind me to a person.” He shifted his gaze to Anathema. “Bind me to him. He’s the only sense of security and constancy I’ve ever had. I love him more than life itself--which, granted, isn’t saying much right now, but all the same. We can still date. We can still travel together. We can be together always, and he’ll always know where I am, and that I’m safe, because I’ll be with him. I’ll  _ have _ to be.” His glance was darting back and forth frantically between them now. “Right? Aziraphale, please.”

He didn’t know what he expected. If maybe he expected some giddy elation, for Aziraphale to eagerly say yes. Yes, please, tether yourself to me forever. But Aziraphale’s face softened with worry. “You’d be my prisoner,” he said.

“I’m a prisoner no matter what now, love!” Crowley said, his voice creaking with frenetic anxiety. He shifted his weight from foot to foot but couldn’t find a comfortable way to stand. Nervous energy rattled through his whole body. He hated this, he hated it, but it was the only way. “It might as well be to you. Come on, my angel, my sweet angel. Please do this for me. Please protect me. Let me shackle myself to you so no one can take me.” He was starting to choke on his words and his tears burned. He’d always said he’d follow Aziraphale anywhere. Now that’d be literally true, he supposed.

But despite Crowley’s pleas, despite everything, Aziraphale slowly shook his head. “No,” he said. “I won’t. I won’t do it, I won’t entrap you.”

No longer concerned with how Anathema saw him, Crowley barely held back his sobs. “You have to,” he said. “Please. Don’t let them take me away again.”

“I won’t do that either,” Aziraphale said. He squared his shoulders and strode up to the circle, standing just outside of it. He glanced back at Anathema. “He could be bound to any object, yes? Am I understanding this correctly?”

Anathema nodded. “Vessels vary widely. As long as it’s a physical object, it could work.”

“No matter the size?” Aziraphale said. When Anathema nodded, he smiled, then glanced down into his hands. “Now,” he said to Crowley, “I know it’s not quite your style. But.” He slowly began to twist and wiggle the ring loose from his pinkie finger. It gave way with all the stubbornness of a ring that has not budged for decades upon countless decades. “If you are so determined to bind yourself to something of mine, let it be this. You needn’t even wear it, you could simply carry it with you. Then, you would still be free to come and go as you please, while still having a reminder of me close, to keep you safe.” He held the ring out in the palm of his hand. 

Crowley stared at it in breathless awe. Gingerly he took Aziraphale’s hand with one of his own, and picked up the ornate gold ring with the other, studying it. “I couldn’t possibly,” he whispered. “You’ve had it so long.”

“Nothing I have is more important to me than you,” said Aziraphale. He gently closed Crowley’s hand around the ring. “Besides… you’ll be giving me another to replace it soon, I take it?”

Ridiculous angel. But clever, always so clever. Crowley sniffled and nodded, and even chuckled a little bit, and held Aziraphale’s ring close to his heart. Surely it had been with him so long, it must have as much of his angelic heart in it as the Bentley bore Crowley’s demonic soul. A little piece of Aziraphale to keep him safe. “Not fair,” he murmured. “I was supposed to ask you first.”

Aziraphale leaned in. “I haven’t asked for anything except for you to be safe, and free,” he said. 

Crowley couldn’t help himself. He closed the distance and kissed him. And he expected, at first, to be more scared. But instead, he felt so light when his lips met Aziraphale’s lips. Because Aziraphale was warm and soft, and he was a sanctuary unto himself. Because he responded so gently, hesitated to even caress Crowley’s arm as he returned the kiss, but he did, and Crowley let him. It let Crowley know that his lips were free and unthreaded, unviolated by others. They were his, and Aziraphale was his, and he could stand, he thought, to belong to Aziraphale if belonging meant this. When he broke the kiss, he was shivering a bit, and he was anxious, but he felt a touch stronger than he had before. 

“I’m ready,” he said, his eyes still on Aziraphale. And he kept his eyes fixed on him as he felt the magic welling up around him. Watched him intently as his mind and body tried to flood him with terror. But for the first time since he’d come home, he felt he could see it through. He had someone watching over him.


	8. VIII: Judge & Jury

“You haven’t told him,” Anathema said. It wasn’t a question.

Aziraphale stared into the cup of tea they had offered him, wishing it was something else. Wine, maybe. Or stronger. He could make it wine, if he really wanted to, but he hated to be rude when offered such hospitality. “No,” he told his tea. “I haven’t.”

“Well, shouldn’t he know?” said Newton, adding a bit more sugar to his own tea. “He was there.”

“He was traumatized. Trauma can make you forget.” Anathema had a big mug of coffee for herself. Not that she wasn’t a tea drinker, she just wasn’t particularly exclusive. 

Besides, Crowley hadn’t been fully in command of his senses at the time of the massacre, but neither of them said that. Newt didn’t need to know all the details if Crowley didn’t want to say.

The three of them were gathered in the kitchen while Crowley slept in the guest room. After the ritual he’d collapsed in exhaustion, it seemed to have taken a lot out of him. Anathema said that he was welcome to sleep there as long as he needed to, but knowing how long Crowley could sleep if he wanted to, Aziraphale said Newt could take them home if it took longer than a day. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that though; Aziraphale missed Crowley so terribly when he was asleep. It was fine in small doses, and sometimes he even looked peaceful, when the nightmares didn’t ensnare him. But Aziraphale had developed this increasing hatred of being alone with his thoughts. If he could focus on taking care of Crowley instead, it was fine. He could push it all down, deep down. But right now, waiting for him, even in good company, he swore he could smell the blood and the burnt flesh. He lowered his head over his tea and tried to focus on the smell of that instead.

“He deserves to know that the people who hurt him are gone,” Anathema said, leaning against her kitchen island. “He was so worried that they could come back for him.”

“Well, he doesn’t need to worry about that now, does he?” Aziraphale said with a tight-lipped smile. “We’ve bound him to my ring. No one can summon him.” He sipped. It was a little too hot but he pulled deeply anyway. 

“And  _ you _ need to talk about it,” Anathema pushed. “You can’t just ignore something that big and hope it goes away.”

“No,” Aziraphale said, and set his cup down. “I won’t burden him with it. Not when he’s hurting so much.”

“Then talk to us,” Newt offered. “We’re your friends too. We’re here to help you.”

But Aziraphale was staring at Anathema. She eyed him so patiently, but he couldn’t help but wonder if she was at least a bit afraid of him. Neither could he bear to ask, because if he knew for sure, he didn’t know if he could handle it. He could have killed her, he knew this. His consciousness had been so completely overtaken with fury that he didn’t know who he was striking down. He’d never felt like that. It terrified him. It only stood to reason that others should be terrified too. So how could he ask them to sit and listen while he belly-ached about his own fear? Not while he posed a clear and present danger to them, certainly. 

Thousands of years, and never once had he lost control so completely, so violently. Could this happen to him again? Could this happen at any time? What if there were more innocent bystanders? He didn’t want this, didn’t want to be a tool of vengeance, he wanted to live peacefully among people on the Earth he loved so much. 

He could have killed Anathema. But there was another fear, deeper, that he had tried not to look at directly. It crept towards the surface now, pulling at his sleeves from underneath and demanding his attention. Crowley had been so helpless, lying immobile on the floor. Everything Aziraphale had done had been in his defense, but Aziraphale didn’t even see who he was stabbing and cutting when he was doing it. He could have killed Anathema. But Anathema could run, she could protect herself, at least somewhat. Crowley had been completely at his mercy. And Aziraphale knew a terrible truth. He could have killed Crowley in the very act of saving him. A stray blow of the sword could have struck him clean across his prone form. If it had, the sacred flame of Aziraphale’s burning sword would have snuffed Crowley’s soul out as completely and irrevocably as a dose of holy water. He would have been wiped from existence. 

_ “Kill me,” _ Crowley had begged him. It really had come so close to that, hadn’t it?

“I can’t,” Aziraphale said, fighting back tears. He set his tea down on the counter. “Thank you, truly, but I… can’t… talk about it. I can’t. To give it voice would make it too real, too present.”

“You know I’m not upset with you, right?” said Anathema. “And I’m not afraid.” She approached him and gently put his hand on his shoulder.

Aziraphale stared at her. “Perhaps you should be.”

There was an uncomfortable quiet that settled between the people gathered in that room. It was broken only by the sound of a strangled cry from the guest room.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale choked, and bolted for him. The humans followed fast on his heels.

In the guest room, Crowley sat on the bed, knees gathered to his chest and hands over his mouth. The small TV that sat on the dresser was on. When Aziraphale arrived, he caught a glimpse of the tail-end of a newscast. Just long enough to see the byline: “28 Dead In Cult Murder-Suicide.”

Aziraphale cringed.

Anathema leaned in and whispered in his ear, “Talk to him. Please.”

On the bed, Crowley was holding himself tight. He looked to Aziraphale, wild-eyed. “Someone’s going to be looking for me,” he hissed.

Confused, Aziraphale gestured to the screen. “But… they’re dead, dear. They’re dead. And you’re bound, no one can summon you.”

“No, no, but they can hunt me down,” he said. He was wringing his hands. “Don’t you see? Someone was angry. Someone was angry they let me get away, so they cut down the failures and they’re going to come looking for me.” The hand wringing turned to scratching at the burn scars on his wrists. “Can’t escape. I can’t escape.” 

“Crowley, stop.” Aziraphale moved forward. He sat on the edge of the bed and gently took Crowley’s hands to separate them. Crowley flinched and whimpered when touched unbidden, and Aziraphale felt wretched for it, but he needed to stop him from hurting himself. “They’re  _ all _ dead, I promise.”

The door softly clicked closed behind him. Anathema and Newt were giving them space. He didn’t want space. It was too much room to think.

“How can you know that?” Crowley asked. His eyes were damp and his skin ashen, and he shook, fists clenching and unclenching. “Angel, what happened? Why won’t you tell me what happened?”

Aziraphale stared down into Crowley’s hands and mumbled.

“Whassat?”

“I said, I know because  _ I killed them _ ,” Aziraphale said. “I slaughtered every last one.” His breath went crooked and his tears started to fall. He let Crowley go. “I’m sorry.” He staggered back off the bed, couldn’t look at him. Couldn’t bear to see his expression. And what right did he have to be near him?

“Angel?” Crowley said, his voice so uncertain.

Afraid. He must be afraid of him. And he was going through too much to have to see Aziraphale like this. But he couldn’t hold it back now. “I’m sorry, I have to go,” Aziraphale said. Had to remove himself, had to sever himself from Crowley’s presence before his own fears and regrets flooded in to drown them both. He bolted from the room, bolted through the kitchen past Anathema and Newt, who called after him, he thought, but he didn’t catch it. He bolted out of the cottage, and into the woods. He needed to find somewhere, somewhere where he could have a breakdown and wouldn’t bother anybody. Where he wouldn’t be a burden. He coiled up on the ground in a ditch and sobbed his heart out in mourning, because he didn’t recognize himself anymore. When he killed all those people, he wondered if he’d destroyed himself too.

***

Crowley came shambling down the hallway in a daze. The last shreds of memories the newscast had dredged up clung to him like cobwebs. He felt them dragging behind, but for once, they weren’t so heavy to hold him down. He could keep moving forward, and that was something.

Newt and Anathema were scurrying about the kitchen, grabbing their coats. “...couldn’t have gone far,” he heard Newt say.   


“I hope not, in this state,” said Anathema. She rummaged through a drawer for a flashlight. 

Newt caught sight of Crowley and offered him up an encouraging smile. “Are you alright?”

“No,” said Crowley flatly. He glanced between the two of them then pointed to the door. “He head out, I take it?”

Newt nodded. “Did you want to help us look? Or did you want to stay here and rest?”

Crowley waved him off and made for the door. “No, no, you lot stay here, I’ll find him. I can always find him.” 

“Are you sure?” Newt ventured.

But Anathema knew better than to trifle him with doubt. “Did you want a light?” she asked, offering up her flashlight.

Crowley shook his head and tapped at his shades. “I see better in the dark.” He headed out into the night. Purpose felt good, somehow, despite the anxiety that rattled in his bones for what Aziraphale might be going through. It was something to do besides agonize over his wounds, and the past, and being forced to think about the fate of those who had wronged him. This was worrisome too, but in a way that gave him a course of action, and action was a salve. 

The sun was setting and a chill hung in the air. Crowley could barely feel it. What he felt instead was Aziraphale. He could always trace his angelic aura, especially when he was in distress. Sometimes he wondered if that should worry him, if it had been meant to be some sort of hunting instinct in him, a demon’s predatory sense for wounded quarry. Instead, it had just turned into a means to nurture his angel.

A nagging little voice inside his head told him it was the demonic evil inside him that latched itself so eagerly to Aziraphale’s fear. For now, Crowley managed to ignore it.

Finally, he heard the feeble little sobs. He followed them down a slight hill and into a ditch, where Aziraphale was curled into the fetal position between some roots, arms curled over his head.

“So how long were you planning to suffer in silence?” Crowley asked, sitting down in the dirt beside him.

Aziraphale didn’t budge, only tensed. “As long as it took,” he said, muffled by the tangle of his own limbs. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to dump this on you.”

“You literally ran away!” Crowley said. “You were doing your damnedest not to dump it on me! But here I am anyway.”

Just barely, Aziraphale peeked out over his shoulder. “I am sorry, though.”

“Stop saying that!” Crowley snapped. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I don’t.”

Aziraphale opened his mouth, then closed it, swallowing down another apology. Instead he just forced himself to sit up. 

“What I want,” Crowley went on, rolling his hands through the air to gather up his thoughts, “is for you to be honest with me. And to tell me what you’re feeling. Makes me miserable to think of you hurting and struggling all alone.”

“But you’re so miserable already,” Aziraphale said softly, wiping desperately at his face. “You’re struggling. I couldn’t give you another thing to worry about, I couldn’t.”

“Could I be the one to decide whether or not I can handle it?” Crowley said. “I’ll tell you if I can’t. I’ll tell you if I need you to stop. But you know I’m weak to you, my angel. It’s pathetic really. If I’m taking care of you it makes things feel more… normal. In a horrible way.” He opened his arms to him. “So come on. Come here. Talk to me about it.”

Aziraphale’s eyes roamed the scope of Crowley’s arms and he hesitated.

Crowley’s shoulders sagged and he sighed deeply. “Yes. I mean it. Come on, hold me, I’ll be fine. I’m asking you to, so it’s fine.”

Despite this, when Aziraphale crawled forward and embraced him, Crowley did feel a millisecond of panic jolt through his veins. Goosebumps rippled up his skin as his mind and body tried to tell him he was trapped. But he hugged Aziraphale back so tightly, felt the heart beating in Aziraphale’s earthly form and basked in the feeling of his life and presence. Safe, he was safe, he reminded himself. And he said, “You killed them?”

“I did,” Aziraphale whispered in his ear.

“Forgive me for saying this,” Crowley said, “but good.”

Aziraphale sniffed. “I didn’t want to. I wanted to give them a chance.”

“They wouldn’t have changed. I saw what they were. I know you did too.”

“I didn’t want to be a murderer,” Aziraphale sobbed. 

“And you’re still not,” said Crowley. “You were protecting me. You did what you had to. That’s all.”

At this, Aziraphale pushed back from him slightly. “How can you say that? Crowley, I ended their lives without a second thought!”

“But you  _ did _ have second thoughts! You’re still having them!”

“I killed them so easily, so readily, so  _ eagerly _ . What makes me different from them?” Aziraphale demanded, red in the face from the tears he was fighting back and the tears he was not. 

“Because,” Crowley said, slowly, carefully. He pushed up his shades so Aziraphale could look him in the eyes more clearly, and caressed his face. “You are worrying more about having killed them to save me than they ever worried about torturing me over nothing. They didn’t worry at all. They didn’t care. But you care. You always care. Sometimes too much. That’s what makes you different.” He leaned in to lay a kiss on Aziraphale’s temple. 

“Thank you,” Aziraphale whispered. He crumpled back against Crowley, and Crowley took a deep breath to brace himself before holding him again. “Are you sure you’re alright? They hurt you so badly, and I’m sitting here fretting over what I did to  _ them _ .”

Crowley shook his head and stroked Aziraphale’s hair, toying with the curls. “I mean, I certainly don’t feel sorry for them,” Crowley said. “I meant what I said. I’m glad you did it. I just wish it didn’t hurt you and your dear soft heart so badly to see bad people out of the world. It was probably the only way to save me, and to be sure it would never happen to anyone else. If you’re waiting for someone to forgive you, then I do. I forgive you, my angel.”

“Thank you, my dearest,” said Aziraphale, “but I need to find a way to forgive myself more than anything. But it’s a step, so thank you, truly.” He reached to put his fingers through Crowley’s hair in turn.

But Crowley flinched back and shook his head. He could still feel them ripping his hair out in fistfuls, often while on top of him. “No, not yet,” he said.

“Sorry,” Aziraphale said, softly, drawing his hand back. He went in for a chaste little kiss instead, which Crowley gladly accepted from him. 

And to show him that it was fine, and trust wasn’t broken, Crowley took Aziraphale’s ring out of his pocket and slipped it back onto Aziraphale’s finger. He laced their fingers together, holding his hand. Showing him that nothing had changed, and he felt safe with him. Safe enough to let Aziraphale literally hold his soul in his hand. “Take me home?” 

“I do believe that’s up to Newton,” Aziraphale said. “But gladly.”

They strode back to the cottage under freshly fallen twilight, hands knitted tight together arms linked. It felt good, to care for Aziraphale and not just to be cared for. It made Crowley start to feel just a bit stronger, despite the fears and griefs that lingered, despite everything.

Although.

Although there was a new worry which haunted the edges of his thoughts, that nipped at his mind where it was weak.

If Aziraphale had in fact killed all the people who had hurt him, they had surely gone to Hell. 

Which meant that Hell knew what Crowley had been through.

Hell knew Crowley was vulnerable. 

Crowley held Aziraphale’s hand tighter, and ran his finger along the ring that kept him bound. His anchor in the storm. Well, if they wanted him, they were going to have to come get him. And Crowley was determined not to put Aziraphale in the position of having to fight to defend him again, if he could help it. He was going to have to choose to be strong, whether he felt it or not.


	9. IX: Deeper Into The Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was going to be a longer chapter, but I've split it in two, because I'm going on vacation and I wanted to get something up before I left! I'll see you all soon, love you lots.

It seemed like all of Hell had come out for this. He hadn’t gotten to see his last execution firsthand, of course. From the way Aziraphale told it, though, they hadn’t bound him in quite so many heavy chains. They hadn’t gagged him. And they hadn’t stripped him naked. 

“We’ve gotten some new ideas, you see,” Hastur said, drippingly fond, holding Crowley tightly by the hair and pulling. “From all your little friends who just came to us!” He gestured broadly at the cultists. The gathered company of humans and demons all eyed him hungrily. 

Crowley wished he was strong enough to put on a stoic face, to glare at them. But he was so tired and weak, and he’d been through so much. He was trembling, tears falling. People were laughing and jeering at him. 

Hastur was cackling right in his ear, saying, “Oh! Oh boo hoo hoo! Don’t waste your tears yet, traitor. There’s an awful lot of people in Hell, and everyone’s going to want their turn with you.” He pressed a hand hard against the small of Crowley’s back, and Crowley felt his body shift as he forcibly manifested a sex. 

They swarmed on him like rats then, grabbing, clawing, pulling him into the throng. His screams were muffled. He could scarcely cry out. And he knew this wouldn’t stop until everyone had their piece of him. It might be decades, centuries before he was allowed to die.

But Aziraphale’s voice, soft and soothing, seemed to cut through the hollers of the crowd.  _ “Shh, shh, it’s alright.” _

Crowley howled in pain as people forced their way inside him. He pressed his face against the floor, tried to focus his mind on the sound of Aziraphale’s voice. Where was he? He had to get to him.

_ “It isn’t real. You’re safe.” _

Not real? But it felt so real. The pain was so present. It was everywhere.

_ “Come back to me. You’re home. You’re safe. I’m here.” _

Crowley woke with a small gasp. He was shaking and sweating, tears rolling down the side of his face. He flexed all his limbs, felt them move freely, and kicked away the sheets that had gotten tangled around his legs in his thrashing. He rolled over onto his side and met eyes with Aziraphale. His angel was kneeling there, arms resting on the bed. Aziraphale smiled sadly at him. “Are you alright?”

“Maybe.” Crowley took a few deep breaths to try to even himself out, and wiped clumsily at his eyes. He reached out for Aziraphale, who took his hand, kissed it, held it. And he didn’t know. Aziraphale didn’t know what Crowley dreamed of. Aziraphale didn’t know what Crowley was so afraid of. “Hey angel?”

“Yes dear?” Aziraphale said, holding onto him and resting his head on the bed.

Crowley reached into the pocket of his pajamas and felt the ring there. He thumbed it, turning it around the tip of his finger. “You know I love you, don’t you?”

“Of course,” Aziraphale sighed. He squeezed his hand lightly. “I love you, too.”

Uncomfortably, Crowley shifted in bed. “And you know that my love is with you always. And if… anything ever happened to me, that love would never leave you. It would follow you wherever you go.”

Aziraphale knelt up a little taller then, suddenly alert, and he clenched Crowley’s hand in a desperate grip. “What do you mean?”

Crowley closed his eyes and nipped his lip. This had been a mistake. “Nevermind, forget it, nothing will likely come of it, not to worry.”

“But I am worried,” Aziraphale said. He relinquished Crowley’s hand and stood. “Crowley, you’re scaring me.”

“Probably nothing, like I said.” Crowley closed his eyes tighter.

“Please don’t hurt yourself.”

Crowley’s eyes fluttered open and he stared up.

There was a flush in Aziraphale’s cheeks and there was a storm brewing in his eyes. His voice was strained like violin strings ready to snap. “Please.”

“Oh,” Crowley said. “Oh, angel, that’s not what I meant. I’m sorry.” Although he wished, truly wished, that the sound of it wasn’t so tempting. It would be an awfully quick solution to the constant fear and the ghost of the pain and shame that haunted him.

_ And you deserve to suffer, you deserve to die,  _ a voice in his head reminded him. It sounded more and more like his own voice every day.

“Then what on Earth do you mean?” Aziraphale demanded. He crossed his arms, uncrossed, them, recrossed them, completely unable to find a stance that satisfied him. 

Crowley sat up in bed and set his jaw. “No. I don’t want to put you in the position of having to make an awful choice on my behalf again.”

Aziraphale’s stance relaxed. He sat himself down on the edge of the bed, getting himself on Crowley’s eye level, and leaned in. “At least let me have a choice,” he pled. “And let me in. Let me see what you’re afraid of. You wanted me to be honest with you. Would you return the favor for me?”

It was, after all, only fair. Crowley nodded slightly, clutched at the pillow behind him. “Angel, when you killed all those people… where do you think they went?”

There was a silence as Aziraphale did the same arithmetic that Crowley had done last night. Crowley watched the parade of uncertainty to realization to worry pass across Aziraphale’s face. He sucked in a steadying breath. “Oh. But… even if they know what happened, surely they won’t come after us? They said they would leave us alone.”

“It’s Hell, angel,” Crowley hissed. “They’re hardly people of their word. If they think they have an opportunity to get back at me when I’m at my lowest, I have to imagine they’d at least consider it.” He ran his hands over his face, trembling fingers in his hair, as though checking if it was all still there. “And I’m tired of uncertainty. I’m tired of waiting for the other shoe to drop. So I’m going to reach out to them first.”

Aziraphale’s deep blue eyes went wide and his breath hitched. He reached for Crowley but hesitated to make contact, instead laying his hand down by Crowley’s side. “You’re sure that’s wise?”

“No,” Crowley admitted. He laid his hand over Aziraphale’s and rubbed at his wrist. “But when has that ever stopped us before, hm? I’d rather be certain that I’m in danger than guess at this point. At least then I’ll know to brace myself before it comes.” It was exhausting, being helpless. He was sick of it. This would be reckless, but at least it would be reckless in a way he could control. Driving the car off the cliff instead of losing your brakes at the last second. 

Oh, and driving a car off a cliff did sound nice right about now.

No, couldn’t think about it.

“Alright, alright,” Aziraphale said, clutching at the edge of the bed. “Well, if this is what you mean to do, I insist on being there for you. You won’t be alone in this, not this time.”

“I won’t forgive myself if they hurt you too,” Crowley insisted, gripping at Aziraphale’s wrist.   
  
Aziraphale didn’t budge. “And neither will I, so one of us is going to have to compromise.” He reached for Crowley’s face, hesitated and, when Crowley didn’t withdraw, closed the distance, running his thumb along his jawline. “This time, I am prepared to do what it takes to keep you safe. I am not ashamed, and I am not afraid. I love you.”

Crowley leaned gladly into the tenderness of the touch, letting it wipe away the echoes of hurt in his head. He wished he could say he was unafraid too. “I love you so much, angel. Tomorrow morning. Are you ready?”

“I will be.” He glanced aside. “I… am going to go get something first. And you must promise me that you will stay well clear of it.” 

Crowley’s brow furrowed. “You mean…”

“I told you,” Aziraphale said, and there was a weight to his voice. “I will do whatever it takes.”

***

There is no phone number for Hell, though not for lack of Crowley attempting to cajole and persuade them into it. They never did get the hang of technology, so while you  _ could _ call Hell, it was more of a matter of picking up a phone or really any electronic device and focusing your menace into it long enough that you connected with a party on the other end. In a pinch, Crowley had once called Hell with a lamp. But that was a long time ago, back when they were on speaking terms. At this point he wasn’t sure if anyone would even take his call or, if they did, if they wouldn’t use it to subject him to exquisite agony somehow. And would he be able to tell the difference between that and simply existing?

But Crowley turned Aziraphale’s ring around his finger, feeling it anchor him.

And he looked to where Aziraphale stood in the corner. He insisted on standing across the room from Crowley, because of what he had on hand. He didn’t want to risk anything.

Crowley took a deep, shaking breath, held his cell phone in front of him, and glowered at it.

There was a brief static squeal, the echoes of the damned, and finally a voice cut in, clear as day to the entire room, “Very stupid of you to contact us.”

“Lord Beelzebub, how are you?” Crowley said, leaning back in his chair and doing his best to sound casual.

Aziraphale gripped the bottle in his hands tighter.

“Was better until I heard your voice,” Beelzebub said. And then you could hear their voice lighten before they even spoke. “Heard you’ve been busy.”

Crowley’s shoulders tensed. “Yeah, thought you might’ve heard the news,” he said. He clenched and unclenched his fist, feeling the shift of Aziraphale’s ring on his finger. “‘Swhy I called. Wondered if you were getting it in your head that it could be… actionable.” He met eyes meaningfully with Aziraphale. 

Nodding, Aziraphale laid a thumb on the cork of the bottle, ready.

“Please,” Beelzebub drawled, a faint buzzing behind their voice. “You would be so arrogant as to think we would bother. You’re not worth the effort. In fact, speaking of arrogance, we’ve got our hands full down here. Got ourselves nearly 30 humans who dared to think they could rape and torture a demon.”

Crowley sat up a bit straighter, eyelids fluttering. “Oh? Thought you’d be… pleased.”

“Oh, we are,” Beelzebub said. “But and it could’ve been any of us, it just happened to be you. Sets a nasty precedent if we don’t make an example of their… what’s the word? Hubris, I think.”

Across the room, Aziraphale lit up with relief, bracing himself against the wall so that he didn’t collapse with it.

“Right,” Crowley mumbled, watching his angel slump slowly to the floor all the same. “Well, as long as that’s… that. I suppose. Have fun, then?”

“Don’t you dare contact us again, Crowley,” said Beelzebub. And with one last strangled chorus of howls from the damned, the line went dead.

“It’s over,” Aziraphale choked out, tearing up, but smiling so wide. “It’s over. Crowley, we can have our lives back.”

“Yeah,” Crowley mumbled, noncommittal, and stared at the phone in his hands. He wondered if he should feel relieved. He wondered if he should feel anything at all. But all there was was empty, empty, empty. An echoing hollow inside him that threatened to cave in at any second. No gladness at the torment of his captors. No joy at being free from Hell’s wrath. Where was it? Where was his sense of freedom? Where was his happy ending? 

Aziraphale pushed himself up, fumbling against the wall, and sighed. “I suppose I’ll be disposing of this then.” He began to make for the little kitchenette in the flat.

“Do you have to?” Crowley said before he realized he meant to speak. In fact, the voice seemed to come from somewhere else entirely. It was an echo ringing from the hollow inside of him.

Hesitating in the doorway, holy water clutched to his chest, Aziraphale stared at Crowley. “It… was for an emergency. The emergency has passed.”

“Yeah but,” Crowley mumbled. He stared at the bottle and he felt so thirsty. There was a hollow inside of him and he was so empty. Once he remembered being afraid of it, the water feeling like the gravest threat. But he couldn’t feel that fear anymore. Only empty, and it was unbearable. He licked his lips, ever so slightly. “Maybe. What if they. I mean they might change their minds.”

Aziraphale shook his head. “No,” he said. There was the slightest quaver to his voice. “It’s not safe.” He marched for the kitchen with great purpose and intent now. 

Crowley very nearly fell all over himself scrambling after him. “Angel, wait.”

“Not in this house. Not in  _ our _ house.” Aziraphale uncorked the bottle over the sink and poured its contents directly down the drain.

A cry of pain crawled out of Crowley, the squeak of some creature trapped in the caverns of him. He crumpled over, holding himself, and watched the water go. The only exit he could see from the cave, and it closed so quickly. It was so dark in here. Why was it so dark? Why didn’t he feel better? Why couldn’t he feel better? Why couldn’t he just fucking  _ feel better? _ He sobbed and folded his face into his hands. He heard the water running as Aziraphale rinsed everything out for good measure before tossing the bottle in the bin. 

Then, there was a flicker of warmth in the cold of the empty. Crowley peeked between his fingers and saw Aziraphale there, knelt before him, worry painted across his face. “Crowley,” he said softly. “I know what you said last night. I know you said you didn’t want to hurt yourself. And I do want to trust you, I do. But right now… I’m really very worried about you.”

“I think… I just need to sleep,” Crowley said softly. “It’s been a bit of a day.” He stared longingly at the bin. Maybe there was enough residual sanctity in it that it would do something. That it would at least burn. Then maybe he’d feel something. 

“It has,” Aziraphale agreed. He held out his hands. “Let me help you up?”

Crowley took a few deep breaths and nodded, uncoiling himself and letting Aziraphale guide him to his feet. He slumped against him, limping to the bedroom. He would have liked to say something reassuring to Aziraphale then. He would have liked to have something reassuring to say to himself. But he ached, and he echoed, and he felt the twitch of his absent wings at his back and thought that maybe he’d never be whole again. Maybe any sign of light was a trick of the mind in the deep dark of this cave. Maybe it was time to let that illusion go. The voice inside him told him he didn’t deserve relief, and the voice was entirely his.


	10. X: Extermination

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I've been VERY sick since I came back from vacation but I managed to put this together for you all! I've started replying to some comments. I cannot reply to EVERY comment, because I feel like a parrot just saying "Thank you" over and over again but know that even if I don't reply to you I love and appreciate you.

All Crowley wanted was to sleep, but the nightmares that stalked him were just as wretched as being awake. Restlessly he paced the flat, and Aziraphale kept asking him what he needed, but what could he tell him? He needed to walk back the past month? He needed his sense of self back? He needed to be put to justice like the awful serpent he was? Aziraphale was so dear, but there was nothing he could do.

Crowley tried to find something to occupy his mind. Music didn’t work, it just reminded him of his beloved Bentley, which he was now infuriatingly afraid of, which also meant a nice long drive was off the table. He tried to take a walk to feed the ducks and see the people in all their beautiful forms, but where he used to see curiosity in their eyes he now saw only hate and predatory instinct. Aziraphale tried to treat him to dinner and an outdoor concert, but even then he felt watched and hunted, clinging desperately to the angel’s hand all night.

It turned out Crowley didn’t need anyone else to make him a prisoner. He was a prisoner to himself.

Which was what brought him here, to the plant room, a mister held in a trembling grip. After all, this was the one hobby he had that always made him feel in control. The plants, by and large, knew better than to defy him. Maybe there was still something in his life he had any power over. But as he looked around at his plants, Crowley could only see flaws. A curled leaf here, a speck of brown there, but each blemish magnified. 

“What’s wrong with you?” he growled at them. “You’re supposed to be better than this.” He shrugged broadly. “Hopeless. Every last one of you, hopeless.” Slowly he turned to look at each one, but they were all ugly, ugly, ugly. “Doomed to failure from the start, weren’t you?” He sighed, his shoulders slumped, and the mister clattered to the ground. “I… hate you. I hate all of you. You’ve failed me for the last time. All of you, disgusting. Useless. Miserable.” 

Crowely’s breath hitched, then began to accelerate, picking up steam to fuel a scream. Then he lunged at the nearest ficus. Pottery, greenery, and soil flew, howls of rage punctuated by crashes. There was a tempest of fury and destruction.

“ _Crowley!_ ”

Aziraphale’s shout broke the momentum of Crowley’s fit. He stood, disoriented, holding the torn leaf of a rubber plant in his shaking hands. His eyes fell from Aziraphale’s stunned form in the doorway, to the chaos scattered around him. “Oh.”

Oh.

He’d killed them all.

Aziraphale was staring at him.

“I’m sorry,” Crowley whispered. Tears started to well up in his eyes, and he hated them too.

Expression softening, Aziraphale made a subtle series of gestures. A miracle cleared up the worst of the wreckage. Some dirt and shreds of leaf still lay on the floor, but pots reconstituted and what plants could be salvaged were resurrected, now cowering in their pots. They had little tears and holes in places now, and Crowley knew it was his own fault. “No harm done,” Aziraphale tried to assure him, crossing the room to meet him.

Crowley couldn’t look him in the eyes. “You shouldn’t have to be cleaning up after me.”

“If I can be of any help, I want to be,” Aziraphale said. He reached for Crowley’s hand. 

But Crowley didn’t reach back, not this time. “You deserve so much better.”

Hand still outstretched, Aziraphale said, “Knowing you is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” 

A rush of pity consumed Crowley. How awful for Aziraphale that Crowley was the best thing in his life. It crystalized for Crowley in that moment. Well, calcified. Its jagged edges snagged at the corners of his mind as it formed. If there had ever been any other choice, would Aziraphale ever have loved Crowley? Or was he just the only constant on this rock they called home? 

Was he Aziraphale’s prison too?

“Okay. Alright.” Crowley fussed with his outfit, pulling himself together and fumbling to put on his shades. “I think I need some fresh air. Need to step out a bit.”

“Would you like me to join you?” Aziraphale asked.

“No.”

Clearly caught off guard by the answer, Aziraphale stammered a moment before forcing out, “Will you be alright on your own?”

“Just have to clear my head,” Crowley said, waving off Aziraphale’s concerns. He made a beeline for the door. “Be somewhere else.”

To Crowley’s retreating back, Aziraphale called, “I love you.”

Crowley shivered. “Yeah.” And he put the door between himself and the angel. 

Unsteady but insistent footfalls carried Crowley away to a destination unknown to him. He didn’t really see the world around him so much. Everything was all caught up in the void he was lost in. The echoing hurt and the emptiness and the regrets and shames that dripped along the walls. 

Aziraphale. Beautiful, wonderful Aziraphale. He’d done so much for him. He’d saved Crowley from his tormentors, more than once now. He was working so hard to help him and take care of him. Aziraphale could be doing anything right now. He could be traveling the world, sampling the finest foods every country had to offer, exploring marketplaces and discovering literature and keepsakes to line the walls of that cozy nest he’d made of his bookshop. He could be taking in live theater, enjoying a symphony, learning a new dance. He could be doing anything, and instead he was babysitting a broken demon. Aziraphale had set Crowley free and now Crowley wished he could return the favor.

It wasn’t unlike the Fall, this feeling that had come over him. The sickening weight in your gut, the endless plummet, the void all around you, always bracing yourself to hit the ground but it never seemed to come. He’d let down God, and he never understood why, and he resented it. But now he was letting down Aziraphale too, so maybe that was just his nature. Maybe his captors had been right about him. No, they’d definitely been right about him. They knew who he was. They could see it plain as the wings they tore from his back. It coursed in his blood and was bored into his soul. 

Unforgivable.

By definition. 

Crowley yelped.

Not at the realization, no. That landed with a simple, sinking certainty. He yelped because of the pain in his fingertips. He pulled them back from the surface he’d laid them on, and eyed the faint blisters that had formed there. His gaze drifted up, inch by inch, up the wood, the stone and glass, up the steeple. Steeple. Steeple. And the cross reaching up to Heaven. Crowley staggered back then, seeing what he’d done. 

In that moment with the blisters sharp on his fingertips, cutting through the fog, some animal sense of self-preservation in his Earthly form kicked back in. It took up arms against the dreadful Thing inside him that wanted to reach back out and open that door, and let himself inside, and seek his merciful justice in there, to finish the job that his captors could not and that God refused to.

Crowley looked the injuries over. And he saw the way the light caught the gold ring on his finger. Just a little spark of light catching off of it. And he thought of Aziraphale’s sweet smile. And he remembered the day those people had feigned their little execution, remembered fearing Aziraphale’s smile would die with him.

“No,” Crowley said to the church doors. Said to the Thing inside him that kept pushing towards him.

With great force he turned himself around. Crowley marched himself back home, like swimming upstream, struggling. His limbs ached and surrender screamed in his heart but he ignored it. If anything, he’d always been good at refusing to listen to what he was told. 

Finally he made it, nearly collapsing in the doorway. Aziraphale came the instant he heard the door, obviously attempting not to look as worried as he was. “How was your walk?” he said, holding his hands together by means of restraining himself.

Crowley took his shades and cast them to the floor, so he could bare himself to Aziraphale completely when he looked up into his eyes. “I don’t feel safe,” he whispered. “I’m scared.”

Aziraphale went to his side in an instant, kneeling beside him. “What happened?”

“I happened.” Crowley slumped against him, burying his face in Aziraphale’s shoulder, clinging to his vest. “I really… um… I really, really think I might… I might kill myself and I just… I want you to hold me until the feeling goes away, alright?” He shook uncontrollably. And when Aziraphale’s arms closed around him, at first he tensed, remembering what it felt like to be so restrained. But then he relaxed, because it was Aziraphale, his softness, his warmth, all around him.

“Of course I will,” Aziraphale whispered in his ear. “I’ve made a promise to keep you safe.” He kissed him on the forehead, gently, once. Experimentally he tried rubbing his back. “Is this alright?” he asked. When Crowley nodded, he kept it up in slow, steady circles, soothing him, shushing his sobs. “I have you. Everything’s going to be fine. I love you.”

The words bounced off Crowley and crumbled to the floor as much as he wanted to take them in. Once he got a hold of his breathing, Crowley mumbled, “Can I ask you something wretched and selfish?”

Even with his head down, Crowley could feel Aziraphale’s smile. “Well, you let me be selfish all the time, so I should think so.”

“Why do I even deserve to live?” Crowley’s grip on the vest tightened. “They were right, angel. I’m evil. I’ve done… terrible, terrible things. People have gone to Hell because of things I’ve done.”

“No, dear, they’ve gone to Hell because of things _they’ve_ done,” Aziraphale said. “It is always their choice. That’s the point of it, after all.”

“But I’ve manipulated and tricked people, I’ve put malice in the world,” said Crowley.

“And so have I, per The Arrangement,” Aziraphale said quite primly. “And you don’t think me evil, do you?”

“No, I… it’s… well it’s different,” Crowley stammered. But he felt the Thing inside him cowering from his angel’s light.

“It is not,” Aziraphale said, wielding his obstinance as a beacon. “You are the one who’s always told me, the sides we once came from, they are not so different. Heaven, Hell, just sides of a war. We both did what we had to do to survive, until we set ourselves free. And it was you who showed me the way. I would have followed witlessly if you never showed me there was another way. That we could be on our own side instead, standing with the Earth. The Earth we helped save, you and I. Or, at least I like to think we helped. You have always refused unquestioning obedience, you have always cut your own path. And you’ve inspired me. And you’ve saved me so many times and in so many ways. So forgive me if I can’t see a bit of evil when I look at you. You’re… difficult, and mischievous, and ornery, but you’re oh so good.” 

Aziraphale sniffed. He laid a kiss in Crowley’s red hair, perhaps without thinking, but this time, just this once, Crowley didn’t push him away. “And maybe you don’t believe it. But that’s alright. I’ll believe it for you, the way you’ve believed in things for me when I couldn’t. And if you can’t live for yourself right now, if I might be selfish myself, then live for me. Live for me, because I love you, and I’m not ready to let you go. And if you can’t do that, then live for the humans who have come to love you and know you as you are, we’re among the few they can really talk to about what happened that day. And if you can’t do that, if you can’t do even that, then live for the Earth. Because you told me that too, that one day they’re going to need us to stand up for them. And I can’t do that alone.”

Some part of that, Crowley thought, was sinking in. He couldn’t be sure what stuck, because all was a haze, and he felt sick, and he felt weary, and his head was spinning with weakness and emotion. But love broke through, and desire, and a bit of guilt too, but it was all things growing in that cavern inside him, making it feel, by inches, just a bit less empty.

And the Thing inside him went to sleep. It wasn’t gone, he knew it. It was hibernating. Maybe it would never be gone. But maybe now he had a few tricks to help it go to sleep.

Crowley nuzzled up against Aziraphale. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I think I’m going to be alright. I’m sorry I put this all on you.”

“You needn’t be sorry, my dearest,” said Aziraphale.

Finally Crowley managed to peel himself back so he could look Aziraphale in the eyes. He’d been crying too, clearly. And Crowley reached to caress his face and wipe the dampness from his cheeks. “I promise I… well I’ll try to talk to… other people too. It doesn’t always have to be you. It shouldn’t always be you. You have your own struggle too. But I… thank you.”

“Don’t,” Aziraphale said. “Really, don’t. You don’t have to thank me for caring for you. How many times have you saved my life, Crowley? This one was my turn.” He leaned in to kiss him, deeply, and when he did he drank away from his lips just a bit more of that aching emptiness inside of him.

Crowley lingered on that kiss a good long while, then collapsed limp in Aziraphale’s arms. He was tired. It was exhausting to fight for your life. He’d really thought he was done with it. “I think I’m safe,” he said. “I think it’s over but, just the same… would you lay with me a while? Just to keep an eye on me?”

“Gladly,” Aziraphale said. He scooped Crowley up, carrying him, bridal style, through every doorway in the house. 

And as they crossed through the plant room, Crowley caught a glimpse of one of the plants. He saw its torn and battered leaves. And he thought, perhaps, it didn’t look so bad that way after all.


	11. XI: Escape Velocity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are. This is the longest fanfic I've successfully completed in a very, very long time so I want to thank you all for coming along with me!

The first step to flying is jumping. Sometimes you fall and hurt yourself. But you’ll never get airborne if you never jump.

Crowley sat in Madame Tracy’s drawing room, having a staring contest with a fern that he was losing. It was browning around the edges, and he was frantically swallowing old habits, because this wasn’t his house, and it wasn’t his plant, and maybe that wasn’t even him anymore.

She and Shadwell kept their own spaces in their house, for the things each of them took to that the other didn’t care for. Shadwell had a place for all his witchfinding memorabilia, not that he took to the art so much anymore. When you end up saving the world alongside a demon and an angel, a witch, a medium, and the antichrist himself, it takes a bit of the teeth out of it. Once in a while he’d grumble and fuss, but he hardly had the ire anymore. 

But this room was all Tracy’s. It had her crystal balls, her cards, her spirit board and her pendulums. She’d learned a bit of proper divination from Anathema since meeting her, but she didn’t care to take money for it. Too personal. It also had her collection of plush toys, which she had quite a fancy for, and all of them were lining the walls staring at Crowley too. But they needed a private place. 

This wasn’t any of Shadwell’s business, they agreed. Tracy loved him and Crowley, well, affectionately tolerated him, but he wasn’t the most sensitive of people. He knew  _ something _ had happened. He knew that those cultists who’d died had hurt Crowley somehow, and he insisted that if they weren’t already dead, he’d come out of retirement to use every last tool at his disposal to hunt down the forces of darkness. Which wasn’t particularly helpful, but Crowley appreciated the thought nonetheless.

Tracy bustled in with a tray of tea and biscuits and a sad smile. “Sugar, dear?”

“None,” Crowley said, accepting a cup. He eyed the plushes to see if they were judging him. “Thank you for having me. I just… know it’s not good for me to be alone in it. And it can’t always be Aziraphale. It can’t. He’s been through so much, he’s done so much for me, and… well, I think he takes it personal. He’s too close to me, any wound against me he feels as his own.”

“I understand,” Tracy said, settling down across from him and dropping a lump of sugar into her cup. “It’s good to be loved and cared for, but sometimes folk can care a touch too much. Especially when it comes to things like this.” 

Crowley eyed her over the rim of his cup, then set it down. “I haven’t even told you what happened, exactly.”

Tracy slowly stirred the sugar into her tea. “Line of work I retired from, dear, you learn to recognize certain things in people.” She laid the spoon down and looked up at him. “And I’m sorry, love. It shouldn’t have happened to you. Well, it shouldn’t happen to anyone. But anything you want to talk about, I’ll hear you, and I won’t judge you, and I won’t overwhelm you with my care neither. I’ll just listen, how’s that?”

A flush crossed Crowley’s cheeks. He wasn’t sure how he hadn’t intuited that she’d know. It made sense, but it made him feel so marked and branded. The pink on his wrists from the bonds was finally clearing up, but he could still feel it burning. “Is it that obvious?”

“Probably not to most people, not to worry,” said Tracy. “Well… they might be able to tell you’re scared, or hurt. But not like that, not unless they’ve seen it quite a bit in others.”

The hairs on the back of Crowley’s neck bristled. “It was never safe to let people know you were hurting in Hell. It was like blood in the water and they were, y’know, sharks.”

“You’re not in the water anymore, lovey, you’re safe on dry land with us,” said Tracy. She paused to sip her tea. “ _ Do _ you want to talk about it? What do you need?”

“I need to know I’m not ruined,” Crowley blurted out.

“You’re not,” Tracy said with an immediacy, a certainty.

Crowley struggled to believe her. “I felt weak and helpless in a way I never have. Pathetic. Disgusting. I feel like I must be fearful or repulsive to touch now. Like every time Aziraphale embraces me, I might contaminate him or be shattered.”

Tracy simply nodded, taking in every word. Finally, when she was satisfied he’d said his piece, she replied, “And I know nothing I say can take that feeling away from you. I understand why. I suppose all I can say is… do you trust him?”

“Of course,” Crowley said, no hesitation.

“Then trust him on this,” she said. “Maybe if he is not repulsed, it could be there’s nothing to be repulsed by, yes?”

Crowley sat with that a moment, considering. He eyed a curled frond on the fern.

_ You’re oh so good, and maybe you don’t believe it, but that’s alright, I’ll believe it for you. _

“Maybe,” Crowley mumbled, noncommittally. “It’s just.” He pulled down a breath to try to settle his stomach and rolled his tense shoulders. “May I be grotesque?”

“I’ve seen an awful lot in my day, I won’t be bothered a bit,” said Tracy.

“I was raped more times in a few days than I can count,” said Crowley. His tea splashed his hand lightly from the shaking in his hands, and he cringed at the feel of the wet against his skin. “It hurt, and it was humiliating. I felt like nothing. And they made me think I deserved it. I’m… a bit back and forth on believing it too. Some days are worse than others. But I think the worst part, the very worst part, is that a few times they actually made me come. And it felt like my own body was turning against me, and against Aziraphale too, because I didn’t want it, but if I didn’t want it, they wouldn’t be able to get that out of me, would they?” He felt so nauseous, felt the color crawling out of his skin. He hadn’t been able to say it, not even to Aziraphale, especially not to Aziraphale.

“It’s a reflex, dearie,” said Tracy. “That’s all it is. You touch the right nerves and muscles and the body does it all its own, it’s not about how you feel about it.”

“Deep down I think I know that,” said Crowley, “But…” But what? A jumble of half-words toppled from his mouth, because he didn’t know but what.

Tracy sighed. She set her cup aside on the little table between them, then rose, going to an end table in the corner, and pulled a drawer open. “May I give you something?”

“I s’pose,” Crowley said, and set his own cup down too so he could take one of her lacy little tablecloths to wipe the spilled tea from his hands. When he set the cloth down, it was immediately replaced by the small stack of business cards Tracy handed to him. He thumbed through them. Doctors’ names. “Oh,” he said. “I don’t… I’m not sure therapy would even work for me.”

“Why not?”

Crowley glanced up at her. “I’m not human.”

Tracy planted her hands on her hips, still standing over him. “You’ve got thoughts and feelings same as any of us, that’s good enough for me.”

Slowly, uncertainly, Crowley tucked the cards into his inside jacket pocket. “How’m I meant to explain my background? Can’t exactly tell a psychologist, oh, hello, I am an immortal demon from Hell, I witnessed and aided in the creation of your universe, by the way, God and the afterlife are very real, hope you’ve been good, not that Heaven’s all it’s cracked up to be either.”

Tracy shrugged broadly. “You can make something up,” she said. “You’re clever. At least think about it, won’t you? I think it could help, at least with this, to have someone who isn’t, like you said, too close to you.”

Crowley frowned a little bit. “You care about me?”

“Of course I do,” she said, lighting up. “Demon or no, you’re a lovely gentleman, Mr. Crowley. And you’ve been ever so good to Mr. Shadwell and I. So yes, I care.”

And Crowley smiled at her wilting fern. 

***

There was something Crowley had to do. It was like Tracy said, he had to trust Aziraphale. And he had to take certain leaps and be willing to fall if he had to. 

First thing was first, he had to swing by where the Bentley was still parked, still waiting. There was a layer of pollen and little petals and leaves on it which was frankly unacceptable, and he flicked his hand in an upward motion to render it clean once more. He wasn’t ready to take it home, not yet. But it had something important. He gave it a quick kiss on the edge of the roof before he left to let it know he’d be back soon.

They had moved to Aziraphale’s flat over the bookshop for the time being. After the other day, when Crowley had his near miss, Aziraphale had decided that a change of scenery was in order. Crowley’s flat was altogether too gloomy, and although that’s the way Crowley generally liked it, there was a homeyness and warmth in Aziraphale’s carefully orchestrated clutter that made it feel like a better healing sanctuary, in the end. Something about the move had seemed to jar something loose in Crowley’s psyche, anyway. The change wouldn’t let him settle into exactly the same ruts he’d been trapped in. Besides, now that they were living at the bookshop, it was easier for Aziraphale to have the soothing distraction of throwing himself into his work, sharing his books with people but trying not to let them buy them. And seeing Aziraphale more at ease put Crowley more at ease too.

At the present moment, there was a small scattering of customers browsing, one person in the corner curled up reading, and Aziraphale himself, carefully watching everyone between pages of a dusty and yellowed old tome of sonnets. Someone help him, but he was beautiful. The way the low but warm light of the bookshop caught the undertones of gold in his pale hair, the smile that trembled on his rosy lips as he read over a passage that moved his heart. The glitter of his blue eyes full of wonder. Those eyes caught sight of Crowley and a look of love and light relief melted over the whole of Aziraphale’s being to see him. “Welcome home, my dear,” he said, trying to be prim and proper in front of the clientele while still showing affection. So reserved, though the shake of his arms betrayed a desire to embrace him. “You look well. Have a nice time with Tracy?”

“Yeah,” Crowley said, fiddling with the hems of his jacket. “Got to thinking about some things.”

“Such as?” said Aziraphale, brows furrowing.

This wasn’t going to be as Crowley intended. Sometimes things just don’t go the way you planned. Sometimes you have to allow things to be imperfect so that they can just be. Sometimes you have to just jump.

Crowley slipped his hand into his pocket to withdraw a little box that he wasn’t scared of anymore. He folded down onto one knee, drawing a soft stunned gasp from Aziraphale. Crowley knew people were staring at him, and he let that mildly hunted feeling slide off his back, because he was safe here with Aziraphale. He always would be safe with Aziraphale. “I think it’s time to stop dancing around it and waiting,” he said. “Angel. You’re my safe place. I never have anything to fear when I’m with you. Because you’ll always be there for me, and I’ll do my damnedest to always be there for you. We deserve this, you and I both. We deserve to have our happiness, we deserve to take it for ourselves. We’ve been through so much, but angel, oh my darling angel…” Crowley flicked open the box, and the blue diamond glimmered in the light the same way Aziraphale’s eyes did with the tears that gathered in them now. “I want to be here for you. Always. Will you marry me, Aziraphale?” 

If the customers who were watching him noticed him using the angel’s proper name, no one made any indication. After all, in their English hearts they already knew they were doing a terrible job at minding their own business as it was.

Breathless, Aziraphale gathered the box into his hands. He plucked the ring up between his fingers and looked it over like a holy relic, turning it in the light.

“Well?” Crowley said, raising an eyebrow.

“You know my answer,” Aziraphale said, incredulous, still regarding the ring with shaking hands.

“I want to hear you say it,” said Crowley, with a wry smile. He wanted the world to hear it.

“Anthony Crowley,” Aziraphale said softly, placing the ring on in reverence, “the answer has always been yes. Yes, I will marry you.”

There was a quiet and polite smattering of applause in the shop as Crowley rose to his feet and pulled Aziraphale into a kiss, awash in gratitude. He felt the weight of Aziraphale’s ring in his pocket. He felt the ring he’d given Aziraphale against his skin as Aziraphale’s hand graced the back of his neck. Tears were falling down Crowley’s cheeks now, and they followed the path of Aziraphale’s like reflections. Fear still ached in his heart but it was so deep and far in the background under his love. Because now, finally, finally, he’d been able to find the place where his life had been stolen from him and take it back as best he could.

When Aziraphale finally broke the kiss, he called over Crowley’s shoulder, “Right, everyone out, we’re closing.”

A small line of disappointed but understanding patrons set their books down and filed out the door.

Aziraphale locked up behind them and took a few shivering breaths before turning back to Crowley. “That was perfect,” he said.

“No it wasn’t,” Crowley said. He sat on the edge of a desk. “But it didn’t have to be. It was ours.”

“It was,” Aziraphale agreed. He approached him slowly, studying the ring on his hand. “It’s beautiful, thank you.”

“Had to be to match you,” said Crowley with a grin.

Aziraphale was struggling to frown against a smile. “Stop flattering me, you old serpent.”

“Never,” Crowley said.

Then Aziraphale glanced up from his ring, finally, to look at Crowley. And his breath caught in his throat. And his eyes widened. “Crowley…”

Crowley’s couldn’t read the expression, and he felt the fear crawling up. “What?”

Struggling to articulate, Aziraphale merely gestured at something over Crowley’s shoulder.

Crowley glanced back. He didn’t see it at first, because he didn’t know what he was looking for, and he didn’t know what to expect. But then he saw a glint of black, and he felt a flicker.

His wings.

They weren’t the same. They were small, and stunted, and a little ragged. But they were wings all the same, and they were his. Crowley laughed and sobbed, flapping them, stretching them out as far as he could, which wasn’t far, but it was something, bless it, it was something. 

“How do they feel,” Aziraphale asked, his face settling into a fond smile.

“Like me.” Crowley leapt to his feet, his tiny wings arched out behind him. He ran to Aziraphale’s side and took him by the hands. “Let me take you out,” he said. “We have to celebrate.”

“Feeling up to it, then?” Aziraphale said, his hands gripping Crowley’s firmly. 

“Yeah,” Crowley sighed, and searched Aziraphale’s eyes for strength to borrow. “I’m ready enough.”

He escorted Aziraphale outside. They took a long walk down the streets, hand in hand, the sun setting over London, bathing it in orange and rose. Finally they came to the Bentley. Crowley opened up the passenger door for Aziraphale, let him inside. He settled into the driver’s seat, and he slipped Aziraphale’s ring onto his finger, so he could feel the metal of it when he gripped the wheel tight, so he could remember he wasn’t going anywhere. It fired up at his willing, rumbling to life.

“ _ Spread your wings and fly away, fly away, far away, pull yourself together-- _ ”

“Where to?” Aziraphale asked.

Crowley eyed the sunset. “Somewhere where we can see the stars.”

He pulled out then, window down, the wind whipping as he took them out of the city entirely too fast, faster than the traffic patterns should technically allow. And Aziraphale was nervous as he ever was, but he laid a hand on Crowley’s leg and gripped it tight, and put his faith in him. And Crowley laid his faith in Aziraphale until he could have faith in himself.

For now, he drove. He felt the wind billowing in his hair. He felt his heart race. And he laughed, and tears fell. He felt afraid. But he felt in love. And he felt alive. He felt like he was flying. And that was enough for now.


End file.
